Descendants
2019
Descendants is a capsule clothing collection, developed with a traditional craft focus. The textiles investigate turmeric and madder root, as indigenous plants of Pakistan and the healing properties they carry. Raw silk is dyed to embed the properties of turmeric and madder root into the silk. The shapes and style of the clothing were developed from studying Pakistani clothing and exaggerating forms, and deconstructing handed down traditional clothing from my family. My investigations and making in fashion are to subvert commodified relationships with clothing and to understand the social constructs, familial narratives and histories of traditionally worn clothing in the SSWANA regions.
The patterns on the woodblocks were created by overlapping and flipping Urdu and Arabic words. The patterns are etched into the woodblocks using a laser cutter. Words such as woman, strength, freedom, love, home. Through the process of block printing, these words become embedded in garments, textiles, paper as hidden symbols.
Taught Tongues, is the accompanying component of the woodblocks. Taught Tongues, is a book which was created as a reference for all the patterns that were etched into each individual wood block to help viewers decipher the patterns and their meaning.