After spending a month back in my old home of Kutch, India, I have a whole bunch of new projects in the works including 5 new quilts that I’ll be rolling out over the next few weeks.
First up, the Nantahala, a collaboratively made bandhani quilt, hand-tied and indigo-dyed by me (Lindsay) in the USA and hand top-stitched by Amli in a tiny village in rural Kutch.
The word bandhani comes from the Sanskrit root bandh, to tie or bind, and is a traditional tie-dye technique popular in Kutch. I got to learn and practice bandhani while I was living there a few years ago.
Remember the solar eclipse back in 2017? This quilt was born out of my pilgrimage into the path of totality to watch the big event. Tying these bandhani knots on the 30+ hour road trip to the Nantahala National Forest in North Carolina kept me entertained in the passenger seat.
Seeing the eclipse shook me in a way I wasn’t expecting. Choosing the name Nantahala felt like a good way to commemorate the experience and capture the feeling of being there as I started this quilt. Plus, the little circular bandhani marks kind of remind me of the glowing way the sun looked when it was blocked out by the moon.
Here’s what it looked like once I finished tying all the knots, somewhere along the highway.
I dyed it in indigo right away but it only recently stitched it up into a quilt. All of the topstitching and detail work was completed by Amli, a new mom in Banda Village in Kutch, India. I was really excited to be able to give her a job she could do from home and she did beautiful work. Here she is (far right with her new baby) holding up the finished quilt with her sisters, and (below) with the quilt inside her home.
Click here for the Nantahala quilt in the shop.
I have 4 more beautiful new handmade quilts coming soon so be sure to sign up for our emails and keep an eye on that inbox!
? Lindsay