Mijwan chikankari continues its international run

Mijwan Collection, featuring designs by artists from the small hamlet of Azamgarh, was showcased at the Indian Academy Awards on March 26 in the United States.

Using designs made by the chikankari artisans of Mijwan, designer Manish Malhotra created a master collection of dresses meant for youngsters.

Sharing her delight, Shabana Azmi, who hails from Mijwan and has been working tirelessly for the upliftment of the area much like her late father Kaifi Azmi, said, “Using traditional chikankari, Manish made some beautiful off-shoulder dresses with a lot of sequence and frill-work added to it. He gave a modern twist to chikankari, which was widely appreciated at the show.” Azmi said that the collection also included some sarees worn with frilled petticoats, which added beauty to the traditional attire. Manish adopted the village some years back and ever since there has been no looking back for the girls engaged in chikankari works at Mijwan. “Mijwan was so small a place that it did not even have a pin code or a railway line. When Abbu (Kaifi Azmi) came back to the village after many years, he thought about bringing a transformation there. I am glad that the village is now in international news,” said Shabana. This is the second time that the Mijwan Collection was showcased on an international platform -- the first one being in Florida. “Chikankari is not an art of Mijwan. It is a famous art form of Awadh. But Abbu ensured that the girls of the village were trained in chikankari and he visited Runa Banerji to request her to train the girls. I am glad that Mijwan’s chikankari is now famous in international fashion,” she added. Mijwan currently has 10 centres of chikankari that involve around 400 girl artisans.

Models flaunt creations of Mijwan in USA

With Mijwan, designer Manish Malhotra