Students of Chanakya School of Craft gilded the backdrop tapestry at Dior’s couture show
Astounding installation adoring the sets of Dior’s show at Paris Couture Week was meticulously crafted by artisans and students of Mumbai based craft school by using 400 shades of organic silk, linen, cotton and jute threads, sewn using a variation of 150 embroidery techniques.
Having a long-standing relationship with the Italian designer and creative director of Dior Maria Grazia Chiuri, who has also mentored and supported the initiative since its inception, Mumbai-based Chanakya School of Craft empowers low-income women in local communities and teach students the skills required to become master artisans.
Launched just a few years ago by Monica Shah and Karishma Swali, whose family was engaged in making embroideries for international labels like Fendi, Gucci, Valentino, Lanvin and Prada since the 1980s, it is Situated in the Mumbai’s Byculla region, right next to the Bhau Daji Lad Museum, the city’s costume history museum.The institute enrols a hundred students every year, and has taught 300 women so far. The school also invites women from underprivileged homes to train with them with the aim to make themselves self-sufficient.
Last year, Chiuri tapped feminist art legend Judy Chicago to develop a womb-like set with 21 panels emblazoned with feminist arguments such as ‘What if women ruled the world?’, ‘Would there be violence? ‘The Divine Feminine’. The ’and ‘ Would men and women be equal?
This time she enagaged the women artisans from India to materialise the work French artist Éva Jospin in the Indian-style tapestries entitled ‘Chambre de Soie’ (silk room), the work drew inspirations from Embroidery Room at the Palazzo Colonna in Rome, and to the modernist author Virginia Woolfe’s feminist manifesto, A Room Of One’s Own.
It took the artisans three months to forge life into the sketch by the artist, the tapestries that adorned the walls of the set were entirely hand-embroidered by the artisans of the Chanakya Atelier and the students. The dazzling drape has been crafted using 400 shades of organic silk, linen, cotton and jute threads, sewn using a variation of 150 embroidery techniques.
The school functions in two shifts having three-and-a-half hours a day, so the women can come once they’ve finished their household chores. An advanced course takes six months. The women learn technical skills, but also the harmonious use of colour and balance.They have access to a library of over 6,000 books on textiles, embroideries, art and fashion.
