Chanderi Kurta and Palazzo Set

Details

A two-piece set in Chanderi silk cotton, handwoven in Chanderi, Ashoknagar district, Madhya Pradesh. Chanderi Fabric is a registered geographical indication, and this cloth carries that GI along with the Handloom Mark. The warp is unbleached single mulberry yarn with its natural gum left on, the weft is fine cotton, and that is where the famous Chanderi transparency comes from. It is a property of the yarn, not of thinness. Non-degummed single yarn is smooth, round and translucent, and it gives the cloth a glassy sheen and a crisp hand at the same time. A degummed, bleached, doubled yarn cannot do it. That distinction is the whole cheat. The market fakes Chanderi transparency the cheap way, by weaving a thinner and weaker cloth, or by using polyester, which is naturally sheer and shiny and costs a fifth of silk. Both of those are sheer AND limp. Real Chanderi is sheer AND crisp, and it rustles faintly when you shake it. Power-loom Chanderi is sold in volume in every market in the country, which is exactly why the GI and the Handloom Mark exist and why a listing that claims Chanderi without naming either is not making a claim at all.

• GI registered Chanderi Fabric, and Handloom Mark tagged
• 42 percent mulberry silk in the warp and 58 percent cotton in the weft, by weight, tested
• 80 GSM, measured, from unbleached non-degummed single yarn
• No polyester and no viscose anywhere, in the cloth or the lining
• Azo-free reactive dye, screened for banned aromatic amines
• Bodice lined in cotton mul, so the kurta needs no separate slip
• No starch or sizing loaded in to fake body, residual size under 1 percent The honest part: Chanderi wants a gentle hand wash cold or dry cleaning, and a low iron through a press cloth. It creases, it snags on a rough ring, and it relaxes about 2 percent on the first wash. It is a fine cloth doing a fine cloth's job. If you want something you can throw in a machine every week, our handloom cotton straight kurta is the better buy.