I am truly passionate about my tapestries: Iconic couturier Bunto Kazmi on her latest work

Etched over an ink-blue backdrop, age-old colonial structures stand shoulder to shoulder; among others, the Frere Hall, the Hindu Gymkhana, the Merewether Clock Tower, Empress Market and Abdullah Shah Ghazi’s shrine wreathed with lively green flags.

Light and shadow, tall minarets and circular domes, steeples, spires, greenery and clocks pointing to 7:30pm; even the stars glistening in the sky are mapped out in constellations: Big Dipper, The Hunter, Ursa Major and Ursa Minor.

This tapestry, created for an overseas client, has the finesse of a painting from afar. But look closer and the beauty is in the details. Bunto Apa, as she is often called, is a stickler for them.

The beauty in the details

“The tapestry took over a year to create and there was a point when I stopped making it,” admits couturier Bunto Kazmi.

“My couture and tapestries have always delved into florals and figurines," she says. "This was the first time I was taking inspiration from architecture and it was very challenging. I sent my craftsmen to see the actual buildings and we used myriad images as reference points. The linear lines were measured with scales and we tried to capture every nuance that formed the essence of the buildings. The client had especially ordered a nightscape of the city while I myself chose the buildings that I wanted to re-create.”

Each thread strand was broken into three parts before stitched in with minute delicacy. It was important that stitches were made with precision. For instance, when the craftsmen tried to make some changes to the Empress Market dome, the fabric began to tear. The stitches had to be resurrected, uplifting the dome, managing to give it a three-dimensional effect that looks all the more real.

Crafted with love, the final tapestry could easily hold center stage in a museum or art gallery. It pays ode to the city it hails from, showcasing a magical, exuberant side to Karachi devoid of the pain that often mires its landscape. It also gives homage to the passion that defines Bunto Kazmi’s ethos and is testament to the painstaking craftsmanship that is sadly dying out as fast fashion gains dominance. The names of Bunto Apa’s exceptional artisans is now written along with her own at the very bottom of the silk canvas.

Keeping the art alive

Far from the generic reaches of machine embroideries, the banal accessibility of digital print, fashion that is instantly forgettable and the assault of copycats, designs still take about a year to be created within her atelier. Inspirations are sought out, researched, conceptualised and translated into exquisite heirlooms. A set of magnifying glasses constantly occupies her desk, on hand to scrutinise the handwork. Embroideries transcend from being mere embellishments to breathing life into fabric — delicate kamdani, gota, resham, dabka, French knots, vasli and sacha kaam in naqshi.

“I have been creating bridals and shawls for a very long time and they are important, for one does have to marry art with commerce,” says Bunto Apa. “But I am truly passionate about my tapestries. They present new challenges.”

The heavenly garden of Sharar’s Firdaus-i-Bareen may stand resplendent with every butterfly a new hue, each flower a different shape, a lotus floating down the Indus or an Anglicised daisy, each miraculously created with a different stitch. Rumi’s couplets may be visualised in miniature embroideries or an enchanted lake may glimmer with fish, with storks swooping down on it from a rainy sky.

“I have been creating bridals and shawls for a very long time and they are important, for one does have to marry art with commerce,” says Bunto Apa. “But I am truly passionate about my tapestries. They present new challenges.”

Her city-scape of Karachi is different because of its architectural details but one remembers earlier creations that have been equally breathtaking. Her awe-inspiring depiction of scenes from the Persian epic Hamzanama was replete with details; from the shades of the sun on a beard to the curvature of toe-nails, the different hues of a tree bark, dragon slayers and horse-riders. On another silk canvas, Fariduddin Attar’s The Conference of Birds had come alive.

To etch poetry with a needle, spin dreams through fabric, create for the love of art rather than mere commercialism… Bunto’s atelier inspires reverence. It is here, in her treasure trove of indigenous inspirations, that craft remains alive. Modern-day couture lost it a long time ago.

Published in Dawn, Sunday Magazine, January 24th, 2016