Saris Under the Spotlight
A new generation has rediscovered the sari, and is twisting, draping and accessorizing the ancient garment and transforming it into a canvas for self- expression.
How can a single, unstitched length of cloth have such a lavish story to tell?
That's just what curator Priya Khanchandani explores in “The Offbeat Sari,” an exhibition at London's Design Museum that runs until Sept. 17.
Three years in the making, it is Britain's first, largescale exhibition to examine the sari from all angles and showcases dozens of styles, nearly all of them on loan from designers and studios across India.
Far older, and more democratic, than a pair of blue jeans, the sari has been worn for thousands of years by rich and poor, aristocrats and laborers, and all genders. Over the centuries it has been protective, decorative, and worn as a means of political, cultural and self-expression.
Latterly, the sari has also become a go-to garment for a new generation. Influencers are showing off their draping techniques on YouTube; designers are working with innovative colors and materials, and social media is brimming with shots of couture saris, sporty ones and sustainable styles, too.
The show is rich and organized around themes of innovation, form, identity, resistance and materiality.
It forces viewers to step outside themselves, look at the sari with fresh eyes, and at the work of emerging and established brands and designers including Raw Mango, Diksha Khanna, Huemn, Akaaro, Ashdeen and Huemn.
The saris on show range from the unconventional to the glamorous to the practical.
One is adorned with sequins made from discarded x-rays; others are printed with ink distilled from air pollution, or made from recycled waste, while another has been made from distressed denim. Others are fit for rock climbing or skateboarding.
One sari with a gold Schiaparelli bodice has A-list appeal, having been worn by Natasha Poonawalla on the red carpet at the 2022 Met Gala.
Khanchandani, who is head of curatorial at the Design Museum, says she was eager to look at the significance of the sari in the here and now, and to disrupt preconceived notions of such an everyday, ubiquitous garment.
It was quite a task given that the sari has been alive and present in people's wardrobes for so long.
“There could be 1,000 exhibitions, 1,000 different stories about the sari,” says Khanchandani. “This one highlights the significance of the sari as a rich, dynamic canvas for contemporary design.”
She also wanted to discard the Western cultural filters — and banish any sense of exoticism. Instead, Khanchandani says she wanted to look at the sari from a fresh perspective, examine its contribution to contemporary visual language, and see where it fits into the global design conversation.
Why now? She says that while the sari's popularity in southeast Asia has ebbed and flowed (there was a lull in the ‘80s and the ‘90s when the sari fell out of fashion), a new generation of designers has emerged. They're looking at the garment in new ways, and garnering attention from investors.
Khanchandani began to notice a new attitude to the sari when she was living in Delhi around 2015.
“It was being taken up by younger, cosmopolitan women and there were a number of brands that were at the vanguard, such as Raw Mango, and those brands are now coming of age. They're expanding across India and being approached by big investors with the opportunity to go global. I think their relevance and impact is reaching a particular turning point,” she says.
Asked what surprised her most as she was putting together the show, Khanchandani says it was “the amount of creativity coming out of individual homes,” how people styled their saris on a daily basis — with shirts, T-shirts, bags, sneakers and sunglasses — and how the sari can contribute to body positivity.
“At the exhibition, we have a wall showing images of different wearers across South Asia, but also
internationally. It shows an immense amount of creativity and ingenuity,” says Khanchandani.
The show also offers much food for thought: urging viewers to interrogate what they wear, why they wear it, and what clothing can say about culture, family and community. It's something that very few fashion exhibitions, which tend to focus on a single designer's work or an historical moment, manage to do.
But then, the Design Museum is building a reputation as a challenger to places such as the Victoria and Albert Museum, looking at fashion and design in a contemporary context, and forever asking, “What's next?”