Designer Vino Supraja is all set to current her assortment Weave: A Bhavani Tribute at the London Fashion Week later this month. Her line will function purses made utilizing handwoven jamakkalams recognized for his or her daring, wealthy stripes in reds, blues, and greens, other than western silhouettes made with patch-worked materials inspired by the rugs. The assortment is the end result of a journey that Vino took to Bhavani in Erode district two years in the past.
A weaver with the jamakkalam
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Special association
“I wanted to explore the region’s handwoven jamakkalams,” says Vino, who has additionally labored with a weaving cluster in Chennimalai for her line inspired by the folks artwork type of therukoothu. At Bhavani, Vino noticed damaged and dusty looms coated in cobwebs. “I did not meet many young weavers, with the existing seniors themselves not getting much work,” says the designer who’s now based mostly in Dubai.
She feels that the rug format might not do a lot to revive the craft. “Jamakkalams were traditionally spread on the floor for special occasions,” she says: “But people have stopped sitting on the floor these days.” Vino wished to reimagine the rug as a trend product. “The striking patterns are on a par with the Gucci stripes or the Burberry pattern,” she says.
From Vino Supraja’s assortment that includes the Bhavani jamakkalam
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Special association
While jamakkalam bags aren’t new, Vino’s concept was to craft premium merchandise that she will market in Dubai and Singapore the place she retails. “I wanted to label and package it well,” she says. “The story that most luxury brands promote is that their products are entirely handmade. How is the jamakkalam any lesser? It is a heritage product, and I wanted to do my part for it,” she says.
The R&D took nearly a yr, with challenges in working with the cloth. “The way colouring is done has changed over the years,” factors out Vino: “In the jamakkalam, horizontal lines are coloured and vertical lines are white, but in the end product, weavers employ a technique such that the white is not visible.” This function proved to be troublesome to beat whereas making the bags. “The white tended to be visible when we bent the fabric,” she says.
Designer Vino Supraja
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Special association
Diligent R&D helped resolve such points and Vino labored with grasp weaver Sakthivel Periyasamy to give you a line of purses in inexperienced, crimson, and purple. Vino is from Vandavasi close to Thiruvannamalai. An architect by training, she has dabbled in radio jockeying and tv presentation earlier than discovering her name in trend designing. This is her second time at the London Fashion Week; her line Purisai was showcased at the occasion in 2023.
From the J Collection by Vino Supraja
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Special association
Her upcoming showcase will probably be kicked-off by a efficiency by classical dancer and theatre artist Vaanmadhi Jagan. “She will introduce the jamakkalam to the London audience,” explains Vino. Vaanmadhi’s piece, lasting a little over a minute, has been choreographed by Palani Murugan, a therukoothu actor from the Purisai Duraisami Kannappa Thambiran Therukoothu Manram, to music composed by Paul Jacob.
“In keeping with the folk beats of the track, I have picked foot movements from devarattam and thapattam for the piece,” says Palani, including that the dancer will probably be holding the cloth in hand. “Towards the end, she has also incorporated eye movements from Bharatanatyam,” he provides. The piece will set the stage for fashions to stroll the ramp, additionally to “playful, foot-tapping music” by Paul, Vino says.
When she conceived the present, Vino regarded for music rooted in Tamil folks traditions. “I also wanted some English rap on top of it,” she says. She spoke about this to Paul, who supplied her a monitor he had composed years in the past, that includes the voices of Chinnaponnu and Anthony Daasan. “He has used instruments such as the parai and kombu in it, and the lines are inspired by a Bharati poem that talks about the environment and saving our forests,” she says.
Vaanmadhi, who visited Bhavani with the designer, got here up with a motif for the piece that was inspired by the meditative, rhythmic clackety-clack of the loom. “The visual score for the performance is based on the swing of the straight lines and colourful bands of the jamakkalam,” she says.
Music, says Vaanmadhi, is the most essential component in a trend present. “It sets the tone for what the designer is set to showcase,” she says. Takers for the jamakkalam could also be on the decline; maybe the trend world will flip the tide.
The London Fashion Week is on from September 18 to 22. Bags in the J Collection are priced from ₹9575 onwards.