My colleague is going to rest in Goa. Magnificent beaches, ocean waves, open-air discos, tropical fruits almost for free and seafood, which we do not even suspect ...
True, the real India, in my opinion, begins north. Cows lying across the highway for as long as they want, impudent and funny monkeys who know how to get angry like nonsense old women ... Heavy smells are everywhere - from sweet flower to waste ... you know who and what. Someone dumps trash right on the road, and next to the traveler calmly spreads his rug and goes to rest. True, next to him there will be unbearable noise for the European’s ear and unbelievable chaos reigning - it’s extremely scary to drive and cross Indian highways, it seems to me that it’s impossible for the European to get used to it! Just as it is impossible to get used to poverty, to the lack of basic hygiene, to begging ... And next to the east are magnificent and magnificent temples and parks. And in the outback - landscapes that strongly resemble Russian, the same deserted and wild. Only here people are smiling - always, everywhere and everything, from children to the elderly.
And bright motleyness - in clothes, jewelry, including temples and animals. Respect for traditions - in everything, in absolutely everything, from religion to crafts, which Indians have been engaged in unchanged for thousands of years, from generation to generation - the same thing, the same thing.
Modern quarters in big cities, comfortable apartments in luxury homes, luxury villas, Bollywood - colorful, melodramatic, tearful, sentimental. And fashion is modern European, but also with a national touch.
AND handmade goods of the highest quality and at a relatively inexpensive, or at least not many times overpriced price.
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The figure eight in Asia is considered lucky. Eden translates as "paradise" and Avenue - A street leading to paradise. The address 8 Eden Avenue - this Fashion House Cashmere Shawls, which gives work to the residents of a large village.
Mukti Dutta with girlfriend and partner Jessica Gruner
Fashion, perseverance, resilience, humanity - in the era of cheap clothes and rapidly changing trends, it turns out to be not so easy to follow these criteria. Not an easy task, yes. And yet, Mukti Datta and Jessica Gruner in 2009 signed up for this project. Luxurious embroidery, divine painting and incredibly soft materials: cashmere and silk - this is what makes their shawls and scarves exclusive. And also the social problems that this project is intended to solve.
In the 90s, Mukti founded an Indian organization whose purpose was not to make a profit, but to create jobs. Pandachuli Women Weavers (Pandachuli - the name of the mountains near Almora in the Himalayas) is a weaving mill with 800 jobs for women who were no longer able to earn their living by hard work in the field.
Work at the factory is only manual, it concerns weaving or embroidery - each cashmere shawl keeps the warmth of female hands. Hand-woven fabrics are dyed and ennobled with embroidery, one of the oldest and most refined in the world, the technique of which only a few families own.It takes almost three months to make one shawl.
Jessica Gruner sells these shawls worldwide under the brand name 8 Eden Avenue.
Photo: Daniel Bridet.
Material prepared by Elena Karpova
