A client stopped by to look at my collection of ralli quilts from Sindh, a region that straddles the Pakistan/India border.  I pulled out all the quilts so we could look at them, and they ended up in a big pile–and I thought this haphazard arrangement showed off their diverse colors and patterns really nicely.

These rallis all happen to be bedcovers, but using the same technique of piecing and quilting, the ladies of Sindh would also fashion bags, saddle blankets and other household items.

The photos shown on this post show the proper fronts of the rallis, which are always based on a kind of repeat-pattern geometric design using scraps of  cotton cloth as the medium.  Very often, however, the backs of rallis employ a more expressionistic and less formalized piecing of repurposed cloth— and the backs are generally more to my liking.

Notice the tremendous amount of piecing, applique work and hand stitching that make up each of these rallis.

This Wednesday, on my website, I’ll be offering one of these beauties for sale.  I selected to show a ralli with a beautifully composed “front” and a back that is stylistically very different from the formalized design of the front.

Stay tuned.

The flinty light of today’s rainy spring day makes for a subdued atmosphere to present a collection of exuberantly colored Indian turbans that were dyed and worn in the bright desert sun of Rajasthan.

This is a tight little group of mothara, lahariya and bandhani turbans: generally speaking you can characterize the shape resist techniques as such: mothara , very simply put is pleated and twisted on two diagonals and can yield a  complex and dazzling criss-cross effect.  Lahariya–which literally means “waves”– shows an intricate chevron-like pattern, and bandhani is what is called tie-dye.

Three madder-dyed bandhani turbans are positioned on the right side of the group: do they seem familiar in design?  Through a circuitous history of trade and travel, bandhani morphed into the present-day bandanna.

The group of turbans sits in a mended wooden trough from Gilgit, Pakistan; the trough sits on a collection of ralli quilts from Sindh, an area that traverses Pakistan and India.