Double cloth design

Bappa Biswas, who completed his degree at the National Institute of Fashion Technology in India, studied batik, wood block printing and textile design to complement his love of constructing fabric. In 2002, he and his wife Rumi founded Bai Lou studio amidst the winding alleyways of rural Kolkata. He credits the colorful rickshaws and cloth draped fruit and vegetable sellers as inspiration for their textile collections and passion for handmade things.

Bai Lou studio creates handwoven textiles such as scarves and wraps by combining contemporary design with existing skills and traditions. By experimenting with the vast quantity of raw materials sourced from around the Indian subcontinent, Bai Lou is able to transform ideas into reality.

Bai Lou studio recycles, reinvents and rethinks the whole approach to design in an environment where nothing is thrown away. Bappa works side by side with weavers to help them fully understand the complexities of the weaving process and how to integrate their design concepts. The resulting products convey the subtle beauty of woven structures and the endless possibilities of the loom-finished textile.

Weaving techniques like Jamdani and double cloth weaving are used to highlight part of the design or manipulate it in such a way that it becomes unrecognizable. By pushing the boundaries of weaving, it is possible to deconstruct the entire process and create products that are as creative as they are utilitarian.

Despite his success, Bappa has dedicated himself to working in a rural environment with artisans who still have the traditional knowledge and the ability to push fabric in unexpected ways.

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Jamdani is a hand loom woven fabric made of cotton, which historically was referred to as muslin. The Jamdani weaving tradition is of Bengali origin. It is one of the most time and labor intensive forms of weaving hand loom weaving…. It has been spoken of as the most artistic textile of the Bangladeshi weaver. Traditionally woven around Dhaka and created on the loom brocade, jamdani is fabulously rich in motifs. Source:

Double cloth or double weave is a kind of woven textile in which two or more sets of warps and one or more sets of weft or filling yarns are interconnected to form a two-layered cloth. The movement of threads between the layers allows complex patterns and surface textures to be created. Source: Wikipedia