Joy Bimal Roy

  • Kalamkari

    Kalamkari — the art of hand painted clothing

    I found this Kalamkari piece in a plastic bag stuffed with other bits and pieces of fabric in the inner recesses of my sister Yashodhara’s¹ cupboard. It was obviously a pallav piece that had seen better days, when it had been part of a saree. My sister Aparajita gasped when...
  • Kantha

    Kantha embroidery of Bengal

    Kantha is a kind of embroidery native to Bengal and is almost exclusively practised by women, many of them from home. It is a source of income for a lot of rural women who probably sell their exquisite craft to a middleman for a song, not knowing the astronomical price...
  • Border

    Saving a sari border

    Could love be having to say you are a sari? It certainly could. This border belonged to a sari gifted to my sister Yashodhara¹ 35 years ago, on 4th September 1985 by Partha Biswas, Aditi Biswas’s husband. Our dear friend Maina Bhagat’s son Romil had come to stay with us in 1985...
  • Garad

    Garad — pure silk sari with red border

    The original saree (header pic; on the extreme left) was a Garad saree from Bengal, worn traditionally by married women when performing a puja. It is made of pure silk and has the classic traditional red border. I guess it borders (no pun intended) on blasphemy to meddle with...