Weaving history

CRAFT: A 125 year old company continues with its tradition of preserving art of a different kind.

That India has a long and glorious indigenous tradition of design "" of textiles, buildings, furniture and handicraft "" is well known. As well known, perhaps, is the fact that most of it is lost or well on the way to being lost forever.

But what is not so well known is the Hutheesing Design Company's (HDC) unique history and how it helped preserve the skills of scores of artisans in western India in the late 19th and early 20th centuries by fostering an appreciation of Indian design sensibilities and aesthetics in the West.

Not many know that artisans of the HDC, working with Lockwood de Forest, the designer for Tiffany, executed portions of the Kensington Palace and the East Wing of the White House.

Or that the carved-wood furniture made by these artisans was displayed in London in 1886, and won the patronage and admiration of luminaries like Andrew Carnegie and Mark Twain.

For Umang Hutheesing, who manages the HDC these days, the general ignorance about HDC's remarkable history is not as much cause for worry as is the threat to the traditional skills of these rural artisans. It was for these rural artisans that the HDC was originally set up in 1881 by Umang's ancestor, Mugganbhai Hutheesing.

Since he took over management of HDC seven years ago, Umang has painstakingly restored the HDC studios at Hutheesing Haveli, the family home in the heart of Ahmedabad, and equipped them with computers and other modern facilities. The company today provides design solutions to clients and Umang's plan is to "at some point become retail".

The restored Hutheesing Haveli also functions as a heritage hotel showcasing the best of Gujarati culture. It is also where Umang houses his collection of textiles "" at more than 2,000 pieces and one of the largest in private hands "" from the Mughal and Raj periods.

Most of it is inherited "" the relics of a rich and prosperous family in the business of money-lending and jewellery, that traces its history back 1,200 years, and for most of it, was extremely influential with clients like the Mughal sultans, Shivaji and Tipu Sultan.

"Textiles are an excellent document of Indian history," he says. "For example, the interaction between East and West during the Raj era can be seen in an early 1900 Baluchari sari that has an entire train motif woven on it. Another sari has chandelier-motifs woven in gold and platinum zari, showing European influence on Indian designs."

The fascination with traditional Indian textiles also extends to contemporary fashion and Umang has shown his collection of grand brocaded Mughal costumes on various occasions in Delhi and at an Asian show at the Metropolitan Museum in New York...always to the resounding sound of oohs and aahs.