Architectural Intervention for the Dying Handloom - A Research Paper

International Journal of Architecture and Infrastructure Planning eISSN: 2456-0154 Vol. 4: Issue1

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Architectural Intervention for the Dying Handloom – The Banarasi Weave Samanwita Ghosh* National Institute of Technology Raipur, Chhattisgarh, India

ABSTRACT Textile and Architecture, the two worlds of design may require a vis-à-vis to sustain a dying art, a dying population. The plight of weavers need not be sympathized upon or neither the multifaceted ignorance is specifically blamed. The conditional analysis directs towards stratified solutions based on a single need, that is, Space. The paper reflects on the tailored fit for these artisans, being the need of the hour, possible only by the collective concern and outreach of spatial designers who have the power to reform society through spaces.

Keywords: handloom, loom architecture, organized approach, space, Varanasi weavers *Corresponding Author E-mail: ghosh.samanwita@gmail.com

THE LOOM SECTOR OF INDIA Handloom as an art has sustained many roadblocks and shortcomings but this art feeds the industry of revenue generating magnate, textile. Handloom is largely decentralized and it is the largest unorganized semi-rural productive asset to contribute to the export earnings. This dying skill had to scrape itself off to thin down on its needs as threats pose to its future existence but the exclusivity of designs and eco-friendly fabrics has high demand in the international market for constant supply on regular basis.

Handloom weaving has been duly kept alive in today’s automated world through the transfer of skill from one generation to other [1].

It is also a widely agreed upon statement that the level of artistry and intricacy achieved in the handloom beyond the scope of machines.

Howsoever, these looms are run by weary, exploited hands and feeble trapped hopes; on verge of emancipation.

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This state of affairs can be solved through stratified solutions based on just one medium, that is, Space.

Space, the Key Space is the foremost right of every individual, need of every creator and a factor of every activity or designation. The amount of efficacy generated out of the core bank of resources depends on the venue of execution, i.e. space.

The crunch of it or lack of it thereof can pose a serious threat to the entire procedural execution and also does becomes the underlying reason for all the complications faced by the user of that space.

Contextual Woes Coming to the scenario of Handloom weavers, it being a complete household industry, the weavers station themselves with the loom in their inconsequential homes with the due distractions and multitask and manage with the limited resources available or affordable to them.

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Execution mode requires the highest degree of satisfactory conditions which amounts up to infinitesimal credit and insignificant wage and which is supposedly spent to feed a family for a considerate period of time and this leaves no resource to afford resource for the next production.

Thus tough working conditions, no contact with real-time trade, low productive environs and no technological upgrades make this state a pitiable affair.

Impact directly clouds over the weavers who migrated to other sectors and the new age weaver do not receive a green flag to adopt weaving as a career and thus the number of active hand-looms is declining sharply. The cramped costs of living and workspace limitations are the sole culprits of this dying source of livelihood for millions involved. The policies or the situational conundrums in a society can be multifaceted in its order of contribution to a specific sector.

COLLECTIVE OF THE CORRECTIVE Thus, the only common ground which suitably satisfies all the reform strategies into a single destination is an “organized approach” between the weavers and the consumers [1]. The unmet social and economic needs of weavers’ confluence with the need of an organized for revival measures, gives the ideology towards an “Urban Textile Centre”. The integrated center could bring in the artisans from cramped homes to ambient environs to work, earn, trade and train with the support hosts of facilitators. Present conditions can be sorted out if spaces of each weaver as an entrepreneur could be provided for through which they could possibly selfsustain as they do now and additionally deal with the crowd the integrated center would attract.

Economically, the handloom center shall generate social bridges with earned IJAIP (2018) 1–5 © JournalsPub 2018. All Rights Reserved

Ghosh

exposure and revenue. It shall become the much needed one-stop destination to India’s largest unorganized economic art to bring the country’s populace face front with a global design market. Theoretically, this seems to be appropriate as it is a tried and tested method which has worked for numerous industries in the past, empowered them and brought them together.

But considering India’s every weaving pocket’s situational complications and uniqueness can be equated and reflected in similar terms as the differences in their weaving patterns are not the only demarcations that make them oceans apart in the same country.

HISTORY LEADS TO HERITAGE – VARANASI “Older than history, older than tradition, older even than legend – and looks twice as old as all of them put together.” – Mark Twain on “The city of Varanasi”.

All the weavers of India started out on different palettes, kingdoms and muses.

But the origins are traced back to Varanasi being the harbinger of the tradition.

People, for centuries, have visited Varanasi to seek answers to their beliefs, doubts and curiosities; but the city has always served them indifference. Located on the banks of holy Ganges, “anaras” and “Kashi”, or now Varanasi gets its name from Ganges’s two tributaries “Varuna” and “Asi”. This city is synonymous with some of the oldest temples and most exquisite fabrics. It was a capital of Kasi kingdom and it is believed to have flourished as a textile center when its prince was Siddhartha (later known as Gautama Buddha) [2].

In Buddha Sutra when Prince Siddhartha renounces worldly desires, he lets go of his silks, hand-woven by the Kasi weavers, to get into simplest of attires. It is also discussed in “Jataka Purana” that when Page 2

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Buddha was alive, Kasi kingdom was a crucial center for silk and cotton fabrics.

The 5th and 6th century BC’s most soughtafter commodity all over the world was the exquisitely woven cotton fabrics from Kasi.

The silk weavers migrated from Gujarat to Kasi in the 17th century after a famine, and the new environs paved the path to various upgrades.

The 19th century saw Varanasi flourishing as the textile capital of the region which saw new heights during Mughals [2].

SCENARIO TODAY With the little advancements in the equipment of Varanasi hand-loom clusters, there is jacquard looms now in addition to the traditional pit looms. Weaving clusters spread all over are known as “karkhana” engaged in them are “Karigars”.

The workshop of a single loom weaver is called ‘Bunker’ whereas a master weaver may have 15–20 weavers training/employed under him.

Then there are the city weavers who moved out of their villages in prospects of better opportunities and quality of life and decentralization pit their dreams against them [3].

The city weavers who form 95% of the total active weaver’s population weave their livelihoods in their own homes.

These homes are provided to them either by inheritance, loans or by the government. These “bunker” houses majorly have a one big hall comprising of the work area, where the weaver and his family assists in the designing, dyeing, spinning, warp-weft and finishing off the entire weaved product, in a single room, with instances of drying the yarn in the adjacent alleys.

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The weaver has no window to the outside world of trade and quality of trade and better living. There exist no chances of bringing in more business and thus even the independent yarn buying weavers and brocade designers have no choice but to rely on middlemen, who eventually trade, loan and sustain these weavers for negligible payments. The traders and the weavers do have an invisible goodwill relationship, which should be enhanced in a transparent yet socially viable construct may escalate the image of the product being dealt with [4].

The fate of handloom may not be tragic or painstaking everywhere, but the forerunner of this tradition; Varanasi, faces the most amount of wrath and pity at the same time, and by the same onlookers.

Bengal, Gujarat, Andhra Pradesh and Tamil Nadu consume their state’s handwoven like staple hotcakes, but the worth of the Banarasi Weave is dying with the cheap influx of dupes from China questioning its existence further.

Thriving alongside machines snatching age-old artisanal skills and livelihoods, China’s “fast and affordable” fake Banarasi silks are “keeping the Banarasi alive” without worrying about authenticity or the tragedies of weaver’s shifting from looms to livelihoods, discouraging weavers, traders and enthusiasts away from this weave [5].

ROLE OF TEXTILE DESIGNERS AND FACILITATORS Several upcoming textile designers are working towards human ecology in the area of hand-loom weavers, employing them into their enterprises and also providing spacious, creative and empowering environments. But this practice shall narrow the target population or the diverse circles that lay within the community.

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Private initiatives shall come forth with suitable personal motives and solutions, hence pushing forth an impacted area in the direction of quality of life and better earnings.

It is an ironical prosperity. “In the last decade, Varanasi has become a bigger textile center than before, perhaps a logical corollary to the gradual democratization of a traditionally exclusive product, and the lowering of production values and standards over a broad production base.

We must celebrate it as a contemporary industry that allows masses to participate and survive in a fruitful environment, while affording a lot more people the pleasure of indulging in the Banarasi.

But we must separate it from our appreciation and understanding of the historical art of Banaras silk,” says Rahul Jain, Textile Expert for Live Mint [5, 6].

None of this solves the overall big picture entirely, or even in compartments. It only widens the gap, between the chosen and the left out, and forwards the attention required into a different setting.

ARCHITECTURAL PANACEA Common design grounds for the restoration of lost skills, better training facilities for skill development, well-lit and spacious work environments including the spaces for ancillary and pre loom operations, intellectual advancements and heritage conservation for the high markets, requires the right amount of real-time production space and custom-made ambience tailored for the requirements and betterment of the entire Hand-loom segment of India.

Art and Architecture have synonymously held hands in the public design scenario of built form and expression since time immemorial. Although technology has led innovations and advancements in the field of textile machinery and production, there IJAIP (2018) 1–5 © JournalsPub 2018. All Rights Reserved

Ghosh

has not been an agreed or verified documentation of spaces required by these artisans, their procedures or the study of their ecological environments.

Detailed spatial and schematic documentation and measurements of silk or cotton hand-loom weaving will generate a standard of living and work environment fit for these skillful weavers and designers and it would not be disregarded whenever spaces for them are generated, hence restoring quality would be termed as remedial development through architecture, as the fittest spaces would be standardized for all and for good.

Spatiatic Remedy To fight this and all other cited issues faced by the root of weaving, all India needs in the near future is an Integrated Handloom Centre, customized for the location, culture and people it serves.

Hand-loom as a household art or tradition can never survive upon its heritage to feed livelihoods in the 21st century. It needs to have the power behind it which would provide exposure of the weavers to the customers or the urban patrons [3].

This is why there is a need felt for an institution or a facility which would identify the limitations of the weaver’s community and work towards the revitalization of the industry keeping in accord to the industry and providing direct market linkages.

The built form needs an integrated and identified facility which would provide a suitable level playing field to reach a stage for communication of the spinners, brocade designers, weaver, students, traders, facilitators, enthusiasts and buyers across the world, giving a direct organized and integrated connection.

The architectural motive of such a facility should promote and mentor the audience about the textile heritage of India. The Page 4

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facility should be such that it would educate the populace and bring them face front with the back end of the core handloom industry.

CONCLUSION The abstraction of this situation emerged after studying the complying needs of the proficient yet dependent population. The consequences due to prolonged ignorance now require a platform for the hand-loom field to trade, train and earn to further counter the consumers first hand and know the worth of the manufactured designs to work on product diversification, to be urbanized in the procedural structure in order to survive the competition. The core of this field holds the collective desire of a change in the scenario without disturbing the cultural norm structure. As time has proven, social architecture can be positively influenced by spatial design.

The restorative and palliative reform is under the leverage of architects, who have the power to better societies, for the survival and sustenance of this dying skill in the 21st century India.

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ACKNOWLEDGEMENT The author extends deep gratitude and credits to Dr. Debashis Sanyal National Institute of Technology Raipur, Chhattisgarh for his encouragement and support.

REFERENCES [1] Recommendations for The Handloom Industry – APRIL 2010.

[2] S. Vora. Dream of Weaving: Study & Documentation of Banaras Sarees and Brocades for Indian Weavers in Varanasi, Help for an Endangered Craft, Cultured Traveler. NY Times, 2015.http://www.craftrevival.org/Var anasi.htm.

[3] http://www.pacsindia.org/projects/inc lusive-livelihood-models/benarasiweavers#varanasi Inclusive Livelihood Models, PACS. [4] Ground Report | The Banaras Bind – Shefalee Vasudev.

[5] Government of India Ministry of Textiles. Note on Handloom Sector.

30th December, 2015.

[6] Guidelines for implementation for Comprehensive Handlooms Development Scheme, December 2013.

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