From quilts to crop tops: Nakshi Kantha reimagined
As Bangladeshi designers bring Nakshi Kantha onto modern silhouettes, an old craft is finding new ways to express cultural identity, celebrate rural women’s labour and reach younger wardrobes at home and abroad
Long before fashion discovered the language of upcycling, Bangladeshi women were already practicing it.
Saris, dhotis and lungis that had outlived their original purpose were layered together and stitched into kanthas, often covered with flowers, birds, trees, fish and scenes drawn from everyday life. The running stitch held the layers together, but it also created a distinctive visual language — one shaped by the imagination, patience and labour of the women who made them.
For generations, Nakshi Kantha belonged primarily to the home. It was a quilt, a keepsake, a practical object and sometimes a visual diary.
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But now the motifs and handwork that once lived largely on household textiles are moving onto jackets, dresses, gowns, miniskirts, trousers and accessories. And that may be what makes the current moment in Nakshi Kantha particularly interesting.
Fashion has always used silhouette to negotiate between what is familiar and what feels new. A traditional textile can look entirely different when placed on a sharply cut jacket, a short dress or a structured skirt.
That is precisely where Nakshi Kantha is finding new possibilities.
SIZ, one of the younger labels experimenting with the craft, has built much of its design vocabulary around this tension. Its collections have incorporated short dresses, jackets, gowns and mini skirts — shapes not traditionally associated with Bangladeshi attire, styled with Nakshi Kantha motifs to give those silhouettes a distinctly local identity.
"We made short dresses, jackets, gowns, corsets and miniskirts, which aren't traditional Bangladeshi attire," said SIZ founder Samaha Subah. "We tried to bring those into our collections with our own Nakshi Kantha motifs."
Instead of changing the silhouette to accommodate the craft, the designers are changing the context around the craft.
A mini skirt does not become traditional clothing because it carries Nakshi Kantha embroidery. Nor does a kantha jacket have to imitate the shape of a quilt. The two languages can exist together without one having to erase the other.
This is where the idea of modern Bangladeshi fashion becomes more nuanced. Cultural identity does not always have to be expressed through recognisable traditional garments. Sometimes, it can sit inside the details of a motif, a textile, a stitch, a colour palette, while the silhouette speaks a completely different fashion language.
For SIZ, that conversation has largely centred on two materials: Nakshi Kantha and denim.
Subah has been particularly drawn to denim for its sturdiness, describing the pairing with kantha as a "fabulous pair." The logic is visible in the clothes. Denim provides structure and a familiar, everyday quality; kantha introduces colour, texture and the irregularity of handwork.
The combination also creates an interesting contrast between industrial and handmade fashion. Denim is produced for durability and repetition; Nakshi Kantha carries the evidence of individual labour.
Together, they make the old craft feel less delicate, more versatile and perhaps more accessible to a younger wardrobe.
The label's debut collection consisted of only six or seven pieces, but its experiments quickly began attracting attention. A Nakshi Kantha crop top and trouser set became one of its strongest sellers during its first year, particularly because the silhouette was so far removed from the traditional image of the quilt.
Subah wants to continue pushing the idea further. Beyond the existing motifs, she is interested in incorporating images that immediately evoke Bangladesh, including rickshaws and the Bengal tiger, and interpreting them through Nakshi Kantha embroidery.
The possibility is significant because the craft itself has never been limited to abstract decoration. Traditional kanthas often reflected the world around their makers. By introducing new imagery through the same technique, contemporary designers can continue that visual storytelling while changing the context.
In that sense, Nakshi Kantha can become more than a material borrowed from the past. It can become a way of drawing Bangladesh into modern fashion.
That transformation has not been without criticism. Subah said people sometimes look at SIZ pieces and tell her, "This is just my bichana chador (bedsheet)" or "This is my kantha." She takes it differently. "I take this as a compliment," she said.
The reaction proves that the material remains instantly recognisable. What has changed is where people are seeing it.
For Subah, that change is also about acknowledging the labour hidden inside the finished garment. "A single piece takes hours of intense manual labour," she said. "It deserves to be worn, celebrated, and shown off rather than just slept in."
That labour brings another dimension to the fashion story. Nakshi Kantha has historically been closely associated with women's handwork, particularly in rural Bangladesh. As the craft enters modern fashion, the question is not only whether designers can make it desirable, but whether the people who continue to make it can benefit from that renewed interest.
SIZ works with rural women artisans and follows a made-to-order model rather than mass-producing its kantha pieces. Subah sees this as important to the brand's approach, even though it makes the business slower and more difficult to scale.
The early days were hardly effortless. SIZ received only three orders in its first month. From an initial team of two, the label has since grown to seven people, while continuing to experiment with its pricing, materials, designs and business model.
The brand's reach, meanwhile, has moved beyond Bangladesh. SIZ has received orders from customers in the US, Australia, Canada and Germany, while its pieces have been worn by prominent Bangladeshi women, including Samanza Sayeed, Miss World Bangladesh. The label has also worked with singer Xefer and had early associations with actor Tasnia Farin.
Then came Colombo. In July, SIZ presented its Nakshi Kantha collection at CCWE Fashion Week in Sri Lanka, alongside designers and entrepreneurs from across South Asia. For Subah, seeing audiences encounter the familiar quilt in an entirely different form offered a glimpse of what the craft could mean beyond Bangladesh.
That may be the most interesting thing happening to Nakshi Kantha now. It is not being pulled away from its history so much as being given more places to exist.
A quilt can remain a quilt. But its motifs can also travel onto denim, gowns and miniskirts. Its imagery can evolve from familiar flowers and birds to rickshaws and tigers. Its stitches can remain in the hands of rural women while the finished pieces travel to wardrobes in other countries.
For decades, the conversation around Nakshi Kantha was largely about preserving what already existed. Fashion is introducing another question: what if the craft can survive not only because people remember it, but because they find new reasons to wear it?
The answer is beginning to appear in the clothes themselves. The stitches have not changed much. What has changed is the wardrobe they are entering.
