Chikankari Mul Chanderi Dress Material Ivory Peach Green

This dress material pairs peach apricot florals with sage green lattice borders on an ivory cotton ground The yoke is framed by diagonal trellis bands with curved paisley like blooms filling the panel an unstitched set in one of the craft s prettiest two colour pairings To verify the hand work start with the grain stitches murri and phanda the tiny rice and millet shaped knots scattered through the florals are built up by wrapping thread around the needle so each knot is a fraction different in size and sits proud of the cloth Machine embroidery cannot wrap it fills those shapes with flat satin stitch Check the reverse for knots and short thread tails and notice the gentle pull in the fabric around the densest blooms hand tension does that Finally no two paisleys here mirror each other exactly perfect symmetry is the giveaway of a powerloom copy Chikankari is a GI protected craft of Lucknow Uttar Pradesh kept alive by thousands of home based women artisans The two colour shaded work you see here takes longer than tonal white on white because every colour change means re threading and re balancing the design by eye Stitch it into a festive daytime set mehendi mornings summer pujas long lunches Peach and sage sit beautifully with gold toned jewellery and a plain mul dupatta