A Geographical Indication (GI) tag 15 years in the past have positioned chikankari embroidery in and round Lucknow right this moment. Earlier this 12 months, Naseem Bano, a Lucknow-based practitioner of Anokhi Chikankari, the place the embroidery is invisible on the reverse facet of the material, was conferred the Padma Shri.

However do you know that the fragile fashion originated in East Bengal, and travelled throughout undivided India earlier than settling down in Lucknow?

Within the early nineteenth century, Madras Chikankari, together with that of Calcutta, Dhaka, Lucknow, Bhopal, Peshawar and Quetta, was described intimately in ‘Indian Artwork at Delhi 1903’, the official catalogue of the year-long public exhibition that was held as a part of the Delhi Durbar to have a good time the coronation of King Edward VII from 1902-1903. 

Written by Sir George Watt, a Scottish botanist who served because the director of the Delhi Exhibition in addition to different authorities positions, ‘Indian Artwork at Delhi’ was a useful supply of data on the nation’s wealthy heritage of crafts, fairly a couple of of which have pale away, attributable to altering tastes, and the economic revolutions of succeeding years.

Chikankari (a Persian/Urdu coinage indicating needle as a metaphor) is understood for its thread work finished on diaphanous and breathable materials, and is believed to have been dropped at the Indian subcontinent by noble households of Iranian descent within the Mughal courtroom. It’s thought of to be the oldest type of indigenous embroidery in India.

Watt, in his e book writes, “in historic sequence, it’s possible that the craft originated in Japanese Bengal and was solely carried to Lucknow through the interval of luxurious and extravagance that characterised the latter time period of the Court docket of Awadh. The Kings of Oudh drawn to their capital most of the well-known craftsmen of India, therefore Lucknow, to at the present time, has a bigger vary of inventive staff than are to be present in virtually another city of India.” 

Lucknow-based designer Anjul Bhandari whose eponymous couture label helps over 2,000 girls Chikan embroiderers in and across the metropolis, says that folklore claims that Nur Jahan, the daughter of a Persian nobleman in Murshidabad, was very keen on the craft in addition to being a talented needlewoman. “Because the summers had been very heat right here, Chikankari was finished on the best mulmul materials, to please her,” she says.

Chikankari started as a type of embroidery finished on white washing materials corresponding to calico, muslin, linen or silk. Peculiar satin sew was mixed with a type of button-holing method, used to create white on white designs on clothes, furnishings and linen.

Watt additionally lists out descriptions of 32 stitches that had been utilized by craftsmen of yore.

“When quick vogue got here in, we misplaced karigars (artisans), and the finesse that that they had honed through the years,” says Anjul.

As royal patronage vanished, Chikankari developed from being a male-dominated commerce right into a home-based cottage business led by girls artisans.

“It’s a home-to-home craft. I could must go down to 2 or three villages to get work finished on a single garment. As an example, Kakori, is understood for the best model of a sew known as the ‘Murri’ (formed like rice), whereas in Malihabad, the ‘Phanda’ (millet) sew is legendary. Encouraging the craftsmen within the villages round Lucknow, has helped us to revive almost 18-20 stitches of Chikankari from oblivion,” says Anjul.

The thread take a look at

There are a number of levels integral to creating a material with Chikankari embroidery. Hand-drawn sketches of designs are used to create picket blocks for printing. Specialist printers use the indigo-dyed blocks to put out the design on white materials.

“That is the one language that the embroiderer understands. If the printer misses one thing, the embroiderer won’t be able to work,” says Anjul.

Within the olden days, blocks was once very small, and a printer would combine completely different varieties to make an entire jaal (web or grid) of taakas (stitches).

‘Jaali’ making artisans take over as soon as the essential embroidery is completed, creating meshes inside the warp and weft of the bottom material. That is adopted by dhulai (hand-washing) within the Gomti river, after which dyeing.

Widespread motifs embody the paisley, paan’ (heart-shaped betel leaf), kairi (unripe mango), trailing vines and different floral patterns. Colored materials had been steadily included to cater to trendy tastes.

“With over 10,000 outlets thriving on Chikankari gross sales in Lucknow, connoisseurs must look exhausting to search out an genuine piece,” says Anjul. The best approach is to look at the reverse facet of the embroidery.

“On the again, you will note a stable tangle of threads, with 4 or three strands. The lesser the strands, the tougher it’s to embroider, which makes it extra unique. We do solely ‘do-taar’ and ‘ek-taar’ (two-strand and one-strand) Chikankari in our clothes. Commercially, you get thicker work with three, 4 and even 5 strand threads,” she says.

Misplaced historical past

Whereas the craft thrives in Lucknow, its southern Indian variant, which Watt described as “distinct in its desire for silk textiles, with simply satin sew gildings”, appears to have vanished. Even on the time of {the catalogue}’s publication, Madras silk embroideries weren’t classed as Chikan work, however quite as satin-stitch gildings.

Grasp craftsman Daday Khan of Mount Street, Madras received the primary prize with a silver medal for a collection of silk costume items embroidered in silk on the Delhi Durbar exhibition in 1903. However it’s inconceivable to search out any extra hyperlinks to him or the craft right this moment.

Paola Manfredi, Italian writer of the 2017 e book Chikankari, a Lucknawi Custom, says Watt’s catalogue is crucial to grasp the misplaced historical past of Indian crafts. “The Victoria and Albert Museum in London has a couple of specimens of Chikan embroidery from Madras that had been bought at the moment from the exhibitions and due to this fact their origin is in some way ‘licensed’,” she writes in an e-mail interview. 

“A lot of the items look like quite western in fashion, finished in satin sew. The ‘jaali’ (a web impact created on the bottom material) works are very fascinating and completely different from different types that had been/are widespread on Lucknow Chikan. I personally have been planning to increase my analysis on Chikan past Lucknow and I’ve been taking a look at different types and types though most of them have disappeared right this moment,” she says.

It should be famous that Watt’s catalogue additionally mentions the ‘Madrasi jaali’ sew consisting of a collection of minute squares, measuring 1/sixteenth inch in diameter. One sew can be opened, the opposite left closed, and third can be damaged additional into 4 extra minute openings. No threads can be drawn out; as an alternative they’d be held in place with minute button-hole stitches.

On the Delhi truthful, Daday Khan exhibited a wide range of girls’s clothes with cuffs and panels embroidered in Madras Chikankari. He additionally displayed tea-table cloths embroidered in ‘washing gold’. “They kind a category of products fairly distinct from the intensive collection of tea-table cloths from many different cities … these of Madras have a dignity and purity of design all their very own that’s fairly charming,” writes Watt.

It’s a pity that the craft has been erased from its south Indian milieu, and even its destiny in Lucknow, so to talk, hangs by a thread within the face of automated textile manufacturing. 

“If you wish to maintain Chikankari alive, you must give the artisans their due, or threat shedding them to different professions. We now have to maintain evolving in our advertising and marketing. Anybody investing in a Chikankari garment is morally supporting the artisan,” says Anjul.