International Women's Day - Celebrating our Female Artisans
Stitch by Stitch works with embroiderers who are supported by SEWA - the Self Employed Women’s Association
For International Women’s Day this 8 March, we want to highlight the incredible work that our female textile creatives do for us every day.
In many traditional Indian societies such as those in Kutch in the northwest, the division of labour is often mapped out for men and women. For example, women traditionally are skilled at hand embroidery, and learn their art whilst young, embellishing a “wedding skirt”. Embroidery is often a collaborative affair, as you can see here as our embroiderers proudly display one of our early Kukuben quilts which a group of them worked on.
We named this quilt “Kukuben”, after the embroiderer in the centre of this photograph.
In Kutch society, men traditionally do all the weaving, whilst women are employed in all stages of the preparation - spinning the yarn and preparing the warp for the hand looms. Times are changing, however, and at our Kala cotton weavers, Khamir, women are now more often to be found at the loom.
These ladies are from the Rabari tribe, traditional nomadic tribespeople, who for hundreds of years have hand spun wool from their own animals to give to the vankars (weavers) in Kutch to weave into cloth for their clothing. Photographed at Vankar Vishram Valji.
Our master quilt-makers are a wife and husband team who have been making quilts all their adult lives. They are extremely skilled and complete perfectionists. Here is our production manager, Villoo-ben (standing on the right), discussing a design with our quilt makers, and with Graham from Stitch by Stitch. Villoo oversees all of our production in India, communicating with the artisans and making up our finished cushions in her studio. Her background as a course leader at the respected National Institute of Fashion Technology in Ahmedabad makes her an invaluable member of the Stitch by Stitch team!
Trying not to giggle.
Finally, a big shout out to Juliet and Rowenna, our wonderful weavers at The Bristol Weaving Mill in England, for all their work on our lovely Barton and Barley wool and alpaca throws. They translated our initial ideas and sketches into the beautiful finished pieces. Their help with choosing yarns, expert opinion on just the right amount of alpaca to add, and their advice about the most suitable weaving techniques, was inestimable.
Juliet Bailey and Rowenna Mason of The Bristol Weaving Mill