Tuesday 31 January 2012

Fabrics of India :: Indian Sari Fabric


On my last few days in India I had the pleasure of shopping for silk sari material to send back to Australia. 

Inspired by this wall hanging from a restaurant called Dal Roti in Fort Kochi that had been created from hand loomed cotton sari material, I was looking to source some fabric that can be used to make artwork for a rather large white wall I have at home. 
Artwork from Dal Roti (Left Image)
Sari material would be perfect for the job as each piece is about 5 metres in length and can come with different patterns printed within the one piece. Each piece of the artwork can then be created from different parts of the same fabric used to make up a complete sari.

Shopping for the sari material is quite an experience! First you are asked what price range you want to choose from and are then seated at the appropriate place along a long wide table that weaves it way around the shop in front of the hundreds of shelves full of amazing material. After explaining the colours and styles you are looking for the sales staff bring you a range of 5m long folded silk saris to choose between. As they extravagantly unfurl each sari it soon becomes clear why you need such a long table to see the complete design!
Shopping and fabric overload!

In my case I was looking for fabric that I can hang on the wall and had to ask the staff to hold these impressive 5m long pieces of fabric high up so that I could see what it would look like. This selection alone needed three people to hold it up!

After what seemed like many hours I had to rationalise my selection to just a few saris and walk away from the many beautiful designs that remained.
My final fabric selections
The fabrics have now been sent back home and I just cannot wait to get back in May to take another peak and start transforming them into artwork.

Have fun.

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