Dyeing is a popular cottage industry in Delhi, and most of these units are either in the outskirts or in a cluster. My collaborator Mr Wahid had previously worked with me during my professional endeavours in India and had readily accepted to working with me for my master’s project. He started working when he was 18 years old and has over 35 years’ experience in dying.
His clients include Arcadia group, Fabindia and many Indian designers like Ritu Kumar and Anju Modi to name a few.
For this project, I had a few materials first for testing like- Leather, organza, Knit (Rib, Jersey) Cotton satin and PVC.
We noted that leather was impossible to match the colour as we had to wait one day for it to dry completely for shade matching c and usually the dyer checks the colours at least seven times during dyeing to perfectly match the intensity.
Whereas the other fabrics were all okay to be dyed, However, they had to be dyed separately as each absorbed colour differently, and some even had to be processed before dying. The whole testing process took four days as they work from 10 am to 4:30 pm every day, like that, is when they have the natural source of light, and also because each colour takes about 4 hours to dye and process for the best colour stay.
Wahid Ji was quite helpful and patient and kept working till I was happy with the colours.