This Textile Designer Hand-Paints Myriads Of Patterns On Clothes In Her Backyard

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Meet Alka Agarwala, a textile designer cum homepreneur whose house is always strewn with paints and blocks and eager weavers working passionately on swathes of clothes. She hand-paints saris, kurta fabrics, dupattas, kaftans and more {using blocks or raw brush strokes} and entertains frequent visitors at her Noida residence for a look-see-buy.

In The Running?

Her home is a fascinating place with an overworked adda where her designs see the light of day. She sources the best fabrics and lets her imagination guide her. When she started, it was only to nurture her love for painting and she found a wonderful canvas in cloth where she could play with blocks, batik or plain and simple fabric painting.

She exhibits her designs at Agha Khan every year where she dabbles with different fabrics and experiments with design techniques. The feedback on her collection paves the way for the consequent pieces. The motifs are a fascinating mix of birds, flowers, freehand thatched huts and Rajasthani blocks… basically anything that catches her fancy and we love that she improvises so often. This year, for instance, is a lot of running fabric with nature-inspired prints that you’re free to get stitched into a kurta or a long dress.

So, We're Saying...

Get an appointment and drop by to pick a Chanderi sari that’s literally going to be one-of-a-kind. And don’t worry, she does a lot of young-ish, fun prints too.