Chinar Farooqui is a textile and garment designer based in Rajasthan, India. Her passion lies in studying traditional textiles and folk costumes, as well as the stories behind them. When she was a student, she used to spend hours in museums studying the folk garment collections. She also drew inspirations from her travels, during which she would always pay attention to the local lifestyles of people. Founded in 2009, her own label Injiri is an outcome of her interests in traditional textiles and dresses.
"Being a student of textiles, I love the hand-loom. It is more about celebrating the entire process of hand-weaving - and the clothes are actually little stories about the textiles they are made of."
Farooqui's design does not intend to follow seasonal fashion. Instead, they stem from her appreciation for traditional Indian textile techniques.
"The design that one finds in my products are mainly the textile designs which are incorporated while weaving a piece of fabric on the loom like selvedge (or self-edge of a woven fabric), borders, cross borders, and weaving patterns. I use the hand-woven fabric for clothes in such a way that the textile design becomes apparent and it also becomes the most important design feature of that garment."
"The inspiration for most of the garments comes from local dressing styles of rural India and other folk cultures from around the world. It is the simplest work clothes of peasants, farmers and common man that inspires me the most."
Chinar Farooqui with master weaver Shamji Bhai in Bhujori. As a weaver, designer, and entrepreneur, Bhai has collected and preserved more than a hundred handwoven turbans for the documentation of lost techniques. In the past twenty years, he experimented with a range of materials to create new textile products building on the weaving traditions in India. (Photo: Injiri)
