High quality Indian sarees online store: What started as India’s first seamless garment, went on to become the symbol of Indian femininity. A sari consists of an unstitched drape varying from 4.5 to 9 metres (15 to 30 feet) in length and 600 to 1,200 millimetres (24 to 47 inches) in breadth that is typically wrapped around the waist, with one end draped over the shoulder, partly baring the midriff. It is traditionally worn in the countries of India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka and Nepal. There are various styles of sari manufacture and draping, the most common being the Nivi style, which originated in the Deccan region. The sari is worn with a fitted bodice commonly called a choli and a petticoat called ghagra, parkar, or ul-pavadai. In the modern Indian subcontinent, the sari is considered a cultural icon. See more details on Shop Bengal Cotton Sarees Online.
A factory-made cotton sari can cost as little as 500 rupees (US$7), while a handcrafted sari that takes anywhere from a few weeks to a few months to make can cost upwards of 200,000 rupees. The most expensive sari was sold for 3.93 million rupees in 2008. Over the past few decades, the demand for cheaper saris has made power-loom saris popular, making it difficult for hand weavers to compete. However, of late, handloom weaves are being reinterpreted in contemporary designs, and forgotten craftsmen are making a comeback. A beautiful sari is a living, breathing and enduring piece of art. It holds in its folds the history of an entire subcontinent, the skill of its craftsmen and the memories of the women who lovingly cared for it for the next generation.
According to Chishti, there are more than one hundred ways to drape a sari depending on region, fabric, length and width of the garment, and what the wearer might be doing that day. She created a series of videos showcasing dozens of ways to tie one on. “The younger generation wants to be able to experiment with it, to wear it in various ways,” she says. Among the techniques for wearing a sari: the ubiquitous Nivi drape (pleated, wrapped around the waist, with the pallu (the embellished end of the garment) flung over the left shoulder); and the rural Dharampur drape, which cleverly transforms a long rectangle of material into knee-length bloomers. Most sari presentations require a choli (cropped top) and slender half petticoat, the latter often helps to anchor all that textile wrapping and fabric manipulation. Some sari folds need to be held with stitches or pins, others are more free form, like fabric origami for the body.
Hegemony and its many deleterious aspects include the shackling of thought processes. Thought processes are so sacred that they deny the colony the right to free thinking. Colonization has taken away our right to think in the context so innate and sacred to individuals—the right to express ourselves through the art of wearing. Therefore, there remains an urgent need to reverse this thinking through decolonization. Decolonization entails removing oppressive behaviors while assisting Indigenous peoples in reclaiming land, culture, language, community, family, history, and traditions that were taken away through the colonial process.
Most of our products are handcrafted and the weavers have been chosen with care in order to ensure the best quality of handwork is brought to our customers. In fact , some of our empaneled weavers have won awards at the highest national level and have been associated with this work for generations. Our products and weaves are authentic, artisanal and sourced sustainably , curated by Karigars from different parts of India like West Bengal, Varanasi, Rajasthan, Gujarat etc. Read even more details on silkpetalss.com.
That a long, unstitched rectangular garment used to drape the female form for 5,000 years and worn every day by hundreds of millions of women from the Indian subcontinent flourishes as a fashion choice of the 21st century woman makes the story of the sari a fascinating one. The earliest records of a garment similar to the sari can be traced back to the Indus Valley Civilisation that flourished between 2800 and 1800BC in what is today northwest India. The word sari is believed to be derived from a Sanskrit word meaning strip of cloth.