Category Archives: re:India

India, stuff made of folklore

mud art of Kutch

08/10/2007 DesignFlute 76 Comments

Lippan kam or mud-mirror work

Lippan (roughly translated-mud washing in Gujarati language and the spelling should be lipan)

kam (is work in Hindi and Gujarati)

Lippan kam is a decorative art done by common people mainly women.

Lippan kam is done inside bhungas/mud huts in villages of Kutch, Gujarat.

Lippan kam is generally done inside the house but sometimes you can find it on outer walls too.

Generally harijan and Rabari women make birds, trees, animals, peacock, human figures etc in lippan kam.

It is done with a mixture of clay and camel dung. Now gum is used to stick mirrors.

Originality of lippan kam lies in adding no colour or only whites.(You may get few pieces of very colourful mud-mirror work in export houses online; exotic pieces but I won’t call it lippan kam!)

Small round, diamond-shaped or tringle mirror pieces are essential to lippan kam. Many a times mirror pieces are a little embroidered.

It is simple technique, anyone can do it.

Can you see slightly raised mud lines-spread with hands.

You just need to use the thumb with two fingers! ?

See the embroidered mirror here ?

I just love-love lippan kam.

All of you who go to Kutch, don’t forget to take photos of lippan kam (and don’t forget to send me all images!!).

(Not all photos are of good quality but I had to put all)

(images courtesy Llnosom on flickr, panjo kutch, hodka villages, travelblog, baps care, indi studio, my cuttings)

indian photographers

'every space is truly unique'

04/10/2007 DesignFlute 8 Comments

It so happened that an interiors store Yamini asked Indian photographer Pallon Daruwala to do some work for them. Pallon went to a place called Cannanore (South India). The images he came back with made people at Yamini sit back and think. They drew inspiration from his images and created a whole new line of products!

Interiors spaces from the lens of Photographer –

His black and white beauties first:–

The photographer says – every space is truly unique.

Hey breeze! You disturbed me so beautifully!

cozy in or go out?

Please donot use or copy these images without photographer’s written permission.

Continue reading 'every space is truly unique' →

indian photographers

photoart architecture

02/10/2007 DesignFlute 7 Comments

Along with the camera, Bengaluru based Indian photographer Pallon Daruwala uses light and space as his tools. His love for the uncluttered and clean lines is evident in his work.

A leader in his own right he is dubbed as an advertising or industrial photographer. But I refuse to agree. I call him documentative photographer of architecture and interiors. In fact he has done lot of fashion photography too.

What I find enduring about his work is that his images are intimate and distant at the same time!

I simply love his interiors and architectural images.

And his architectural images are pieces of art!

I have wasted 4 days deciding which images to put and which ones too leave out. I can’t do justice to his work if I put everything together.

So here is Pallon Daruwala’s work in two posts- 1^st on architecture and 2^nd on interiors.

Please donot use or copy these images without photographer’s written permission.

Continue reading photoart architecture →

indian designers, stuff made of folklore

weft, warp, clutch

01/10/2007 DesignFlute 3 Comments

This bag bibi has captured Indian grandeur and royalty onto bags. A riot of Indian colours and sensibilities are portrayed with the use of mediums like wood carving, marble inlay, brass, copper and silver engravings, the use of ‘kinkhabs’, ‘jadau’, ‘kundan’, semi-precious stones with extremely rich embroidery.

Meera Mahadevia is a Mumbai based accessory designer. Qualified as textile designer, Meera in her handcrafted bags uses exquisite texture like silk, jamewar, zari borders, organza, velvet inter woven with multiple layers. Her accessory line also makes shoes and belts and more recently sarees.

Her ornate bags have come to be considered as heirloom pieces and were displayed at Asian Civilization Museum Gallery, Singapore and at the Newark Museum Gallery , USA as pieces of creative art.

On October 3, as a part of The India Celebration Week (incredible India @60), a preview of Meera’s accessories and garments will be hosted by the Newark museum and displayed in the Museum Rotunda and the Education Shop in New York for exclusive shopping. She will be felicitated by the Newark Museum in New York for her 21 years of hard work and creativity.

Indian interiors & architecture

house of mud

30/09/2007 DesignFlute 18 Comments

‘Bhung’ or mud hut a traditional construction in Kutch is an engineering wonder.

Here are the mud houses or bhungas and glipses of people of Kutch.These traditional circular homes withstood the devastating earthquake (2001). They are also considered cyclone proof. They can be constructed with local material.

The colourful and one of the extremely rich in crafts region of Gujarat (India) is Kutch. Many communities and tribes in this region have their own distinctive styles in textiles, embroidery and handicrafts. Each community and tribal group has its own lexicon of motifs and embroidery stitches.

Bharwaads

Rabaaris are the ones who decorate the insides of their mud-and-thatch huts with ‘lippankam’ or mud-mirror work; the Bharwaads are seen in their exquisitely embroidered dresses and clothes; the Meghwaals decorate the exteriors of their mud huts with alluring patterns; the nomadic Jaths whose subgroups include the graceful Fakirani Jaths, live in huts made of coloured reeds. And you can see a group of Jath women walking along the road in their brightly coloured and beautifully embroidered costumes.

Meghwaals

What makes the `bhungas’ so strong?

Their circular design and the steely mesh of mud plaster and twigs make them resist any wind pressure and quake. The `bhungas’, which ‘even a king would envy’ for its elaborate design and artistic elegance, have a light dome-shaped bamboo and thatched roof and a circular wall plastered with mud, twigs and dung.

Their thick walls keep the interior cool when the temperature rises to 46 degrees celsius in summer and warm when it drops to two degrees in winter.

Above image is part of permanent exhibitionin in the Museum für Völkerkunde zu Leipzig in Germany.

bhunga out of clay and reed

mirror work embroidery, hand woven jute rug

Rabaaris

I had to bring these enduring images of Kutch & Bhung before I do a post on lippankam and other crafts!

(Images courtesy BAPS charities, Michael Sheridan, craftsinindia,

indian photographers

le corbusier meets…

21/09/2007 DesignFlute 7 Comments

Le Corbusier creations meets a photo artist from Chandigarh

He was trained to be a graphic artist and painter instead he picked up camera. His is conceptual photography. Without delving into technicalities I call him one of the best Indian photo artists.

Diwan Manna freezes us with his black and white creations. He photographs kitchen workers who work endlessly inside hot dark four walls.

He is from Chandigarh, a city designed by Le Corbusier. So one fine day he went to France to capture Le Corbusier creations. Here is the result: