THE ART OF TELLING STORIES WITH STITCHES
In the run-up to an embroidery workshop by designer Ola Dajani at Warehouse 421, Panna Munyal looks at the appeal and value of this intricate craft
Embroidery. It’s been spotted everywhere from the hallowed haute couture runways of Paris to Dolce & Gabbana’s ultraexclusive Alta Moda show in Lake Como. It’s why Rihanna’s Maison Margiela creation at the Met Gala and Sonam Kapoor’s Ralph & Russo outfit at Cannes turned heads and got fashion editors talking. And it’s what can make a piece of fabric command hundreds of thousands of dirhams. The age-old craft may sound like a simple case of taking a needle and thread to cloth, but the sheer intricacy it demands in its purest form – hand embroidery – continues to keep it relevant and in demand.
“A hand-embroidered piece tells a story with each stitch that is created. It is a labour of love of that particular embroiderer, a slow process that involves many hours of work, which is so valuable because of the craftsmanship,” says Ola Dajani, the Dubai textile and fabric artist who will oversee Needle & Thread, an embroidery workshop at Warehouse 421 in Abu Dhabi on Sunday.
The first known evidence of humankind’s desire to embroider – in the form of fossilised remains of heavily hand-stitched apparel – hails from the Cro-Magnon era, circa 30,000BC. Other early examples include shells stitched onto animal hides in Siberia; pictures rendered in chain stitches using silk threads in China; quilted clothing, tents and armour in Ancient Egypt, India, Persia and Greece; sashiko or functional embroidery to reinforce old clothes in Japan; floral whitework in Ireland; and surface embroidery using rayon in Brazil. The types of stitches, fabrics, pictorial representations and decorative elements – from beads and pearls to silk and sequins – differ widely from region to region, as people used what was available to them, as well as applied their creative faculties to make their handiwork more attractive and functional.
This is also what Dajani hopes to impart in her workshop. The three-hour session will cover the basics of contemporary embroidery, and participants will be taught how to use embroidery hoops and threads of various textures, sizes and colours to create a sampler of stitches. “Those stitches will form the building blocks for any future embroidery work, which the participants can embark upon after,” says Dajani. In addition to demonstrating various techniques, the designer will also shed light on the uniqueness of a hand-embroidered piece and the long journey behind it.
“Embroidery, for me, is [more than] just for garnishing or adornment; it’s a part of the design,” says Syrian couturier Rami Al Ali. “Most of my embroidery is created to achieve more texture and three-dimensional proportions for the design, to give it more depth. Each season I try to use an unexpected material that I haven’t used before, to get interesting results out of it. Embroidery is beautiful and timeless; it is something that you can pass on to the next generation, just like art and jewellery,” he adds.
In a sense, this is an evergreen craft that may not have changed much from its most basic form over millennia, but that we continue to create and covet. In fact, embroidery is increasingly being employed as a symbol of empowerment, with many ateliers hiring crafts people from impoverished or politically unstable regions, such as Palestine; or from areas with a rich history of the craft, such as Lesage and Montex in France where the embroidery wing of the house of Chanel operates.
Japanese obi and kimono designer Yamamoto Maki, meanwhile, works with Inash al Usra in Ramallah. The non-profit organisation is dedicated to imparting vocational training in hand embroidery to local women, making them more financially able. Palestinian embroidery is one of the last vestiges of the region’s identity and rich culture. This is also being explored in Labour of Love: New Approaches to Palestinian Embroidery, an exhibition ongoing until August 25 at the museum in Birzeit.
Another exhibition on until September, It All Comes Back to Thread at the Nelson textile museum in New Zealand, displays 50 works that pay homage to the creativity of embroiderers through the ages. Religious rhymes and grand old buildings sit alongside finely detailed flowers and even one embroidery artist’s interpretation of a human skull.
“The reason why many fashion retrospectives draw thousands of footfalls, or why textile collections of museums are so remarkable is because needlework, especially when rendered by hand, is considered timeless,” notes Bollywood stylist Anisha Pillai. “It’s what makes vintage clothing so sought after, too, especially if the outfits have retained their stitches and beadwork.”