At House of Indira, every thread tells a story. This glossary is your guide to the extraordinary world of Indian textile artistry — exploring the origins, techniques, and timeless relevance of the crafts woven into every piece we create.
Indian Cotton vs. Silk — Understanding the Difference
Indian Cotton is one of the oldest cultivated fibres in the world, prized for its breathability, softness, and skin-safe properties. Grown across regions like Gujarat, Maharashtra, and Andhra Pradesh, Indian cotton forms the backbone of everyday and luxury textiles alike. Its natural weave absorbs dye beautifully, making it the ideal canvas for block printing and embroidery.
Indian Silk — particularly Mulberry, Tussar, and Chanderi silk — is renowned for its lustrous sheen, lightweight drape, and temperature-regulating properties. Silk production in India dates back over 2,000 years, with Varanasi (Banaras) and Kanchipuram being the most celebrated weaving centres. Unlike cotton, silk carries a natural protein structure that gives it its signature glow and fluid movement.
Key Difference: Cotton is earthy, durable, and democratic — suited for everyday luxury and commercial use. Silk is ceremonial, luminous, and delicate — suited for occasion wear and heritage collections. At House of Indira, we work with both, selecting the fibre that best honours the craft applied to it.
Pashmina: The Sovereign of Natural Fibers: True Pashmina is sourced from the delicate underfleece of Changthangi goats grazing at extreme altitudes in the high-altitude Changthang plateau of Ladakh, Kashmir.
Why It is Different: Unlike standard commercial cashmere blends, authentic Pashmina fibers are entirely hand-combed, hand-spun on traditional wooden spinning wheels (charkhas), and hand-woven by master weavers on generational looms.
What Makes It Special: At less than 15 microns in diameter, the fiber is incredibly fine, making it extraordinarily soft and weightless. A true Pashmina wrap provides unmatched thermal insulation that breathes beautifully through cold Scandinavian winters, serving as a timeless, zero-waste heirloom piece that lasts for decades.
Hand Block Print
Origin: Rajasthan & Gujarat, India | Age: Over 4,000 years old
Hand block printing is one of the oldest textile printing techniques in the world. Artisans carve intricate patterns into wooden blocks, dip them in natural dyes, and stamp them rhythmically onto fabric by hand — each impression slightly imperfect, each piece entirely unique.
How it's made: The fabric is stretched on a padded table. The carved wooden block is pressed into a dye tray and then stamped firmly onto the cloth in a repeating pattern. Multiple blocks are used for multi-colour designs, each requiring precise alignment and drying time between applications.
Why it's unique: No two hand block printed pieces are identical. The slight variations in pressure, alignment, and dye absorption are not flaws — they are the fingerprint of the artisan. In modern fashion, hand block print has become a symbol of conscious luxury, embraced by global designers seeking authenticity over mass production.
Kantha Embroidery
Origin: West Bengal & Bangladesh | Age: Over 500 years old
Kantha is a running stitch embroidery tradition born from the practice of layering and stitching together old saris to create quilts and wraps. The word "Kantha" means "rags" in Sanskrit — a humble origin for one of India's most celebrated textile arts.
How it's made: Artisans use a simple running stitch in colourful threads to create dense, rippling patterns across the fabric surface. Traditional motifs include the lotus, fish, tree of life, and geometric borders. Modern Kantha is applied to single-layer fabrics as a decorative surface embellishment.
Why it's unique: Kantha carries the philosophy of zero waste and transformation — turning the worn into the beautiful. In contemporary fashion, Kantha stitch has been adopted by luxury brands for its meditative texture and storytelling quality.
Ajrakh Print
Origin: Kutch, Gujarat & Sindh | Age: Over 4,500 years old
Ajrakh is one of the most ancient resist-printing traditions in the world, practised by the Khatri community of Kutch. The word "Ajrakh" is believed to derive from the Arabic "Azraq" meaning blue — a nod to the indigo that defines this craft.
How it's made: Ajrakh involves an elaborate multi-step process of natural dyeing and resist printing using mud and natural mordants. The fabric is treated, printed, dyed, washed, and sun-dried repeatedly — sometimes up to 16 stages — before the final pattern emerges. Natural dyes from indigo, pomegranate rind, and iron are used exclusively.
Why it's unique: Ajrakh is a living UNESCO-recognised craft. Its geometric symmetry and deep indigo-red palette have made it a favourite in global sustainable fashion. Each piece is a record of the artisan's relationship with nature, water, and sun.
Chikankari Embroidery
Origin: Lucknow, Uttar Pradesh | Age: Over 400 years old (popularised during the Mughal era)
Chikankari is the delicate shadow-work embroidery of Lucknow, traditionally worked on fine muslin and cotton. It was elevated to an art form under the patronage of Nawab Asaf-ud-Daula and later Empress Noor Jahan of the Mughal court.
How it's made: A design is first block-printed onto the fabric as a guide. Artisans then embroider over the printed outline using over 32 distinct stitches — including the iconic "tepchi" (running stitch), "bakhiya" (shadow stitch), and "murri" (knot stitch). The embroidery is done entirely by hand, often by women artisans working from home.
Why it's unique: Chikankari is defined by its ethereal lightness — the embroidery appears to float on the fabric. In modern fashion, it has transcended traditional kurtas to appear on evening gowns, bridal wear, and luxury home textiles. It is a GI (Geographical Indication) tagged craft of India.
Hand Embroidery
Origin: Pan-India (Phulkari – Punjab, Zardozi – Mughal courts, Kutch embroidery – Gujarat)
India's hand embroidery traditions are among the most diverse in the world. From the mirror-work of Kutch to the gold-thread Zardozi of Mughal ateliers, each regional style carries its own vocabulary of stitch, thread, and meaning.
How it's made: Depending on the tradition, artisans use silk, cotton, or metallic threads on stretched fabric frames ("adda"). Stitches are built up layer by layer to create texture, dimension, and pattern. Zardozi uses gold and silver wire, beads, and sequins for a three-dimensional effect.
Why it's unique: Hand embroidery is the ultimate expression of slow fashion. A single heavily embroidered piece can take weeks or months to complete. In contemporary design, hand embroidery is the hallmark of couture — irreplaceable by machine and increasingly rare.
Cut Work (Jali Work)
Origin: Rajasthan & Uttar Pradesh | Also known as: Schiffli, Broderie Anglaise in Western traditions
Cut work, or Jali work, is a technique where portions of fabric are carefully cut away and the raw edges are overstitched to create an open, lattice-like pattern. The result is a breathable, architectural textile that plays with light and shadow.
How it's made: The design is first traced or printed onto the fabric. Artisans then use fine scissors or a blade to cut away sections of the weave, and immediately overcast the edges with tight buttonhole or satin stitches to prevent fraying. The negative space becomes the pattern.
Why it's unique: Cut work creates a sculptural quality in fabric — it is simultaneously delicate and architectural. In modern interiors and fashion, Jali-inspired cut work is used in curtains, table linens, and garment borders to create a sense of refined openness. Its geometric precision echoes the stone lattice screens of Mughal architecture.
Bagru Hand-Block Printing: The Alchemy of Mud and Wood
Origin: Originating from a small artisan village near Jaipur, Rajasthan, Bagru printing is a centuries-old craft kept alive by master printing families (Chhipas).
How it's made: Bagru is famous for its sustainable, earth-connected process. Artisans use a traditional mud-resist technique called Dabu. They carve intricate patterns into teak wood blocks, stamp a thick paste of clay and clay-mud onto raw cotton, and dip the fabric into deep indigo or pomegranate dye vats.
Why it's unique:Every meter of Bagru fabric is dried under the open desert sun. The beautiful, deep earthy tones and tiny, natural mud cracks are impossible to replicate with modern chemical printers. It is a true piece of wearable art that carries the scent of the earth and the hand of the maker.
Ikkat: The Architecture of the Thread
Origin: Ikkat is one of the world's most complex and brilliant textile structures, celebrated for generations across master weaving clusters in Odisha and Telangana.
How it's made: In standard printing, a pattern is stamped onto a finished woven cloth. With Ikkat, the pattern is engineered before the fabric is even born. Master weavers tie and dye individual bundles of raw cotton or silk threads into precise mathematical patterns, matching the colors thread-by-thread on the loom.
Why it's unique: As the artisan weaves the dyed threads together, a beautiful, slightly blurred geometric edge appears on the fabric. This signature blur is highly prized by international luxury fashion houses because it proves the textile was meticulously aligned by human hands rather than a computerized machine.
Kalamkari: The Living Canvas of Natural Expression
Origin: Named after the Persian words Kalam (pen) and Kari (craftsmanship), Kalamkari is an ancient, slow art form native to Andhra Pradesh. It traces its history back to temple storytelling panels.
How it's made: This is a meticulous, multi-stage process where artisans treat organic cotton fabrics with natural milk proteins and raw minerals before sketching fluid patterns entirely by hand using a pointed bamboo pen or hand-carved blocks.
Why it's unique: Kalamkari strictly rejects all chemical paints. Artisans mix natural ingredients like madder root for deep reds, iron rust for rich blacks, and mustard seeds for warm yellows. The result is a deeply artistic canvas featuring rich, muted jewel tones that fit perfectly as striking visual anchors in a minimalist home interior.
This glossary is a living document. As House of Indira grows, so will this library of craft knowledge. We believe that understanding how something is made deepens the appreciation of what it means.