Modern Zari Art

Down in Ajaj Nagar Gautiya, specifically in the Jagatpur area of the Old City, you will find us. It’s an old part of town where the streets are narrow and you can hear everything going on outside. We work with zari, which means there is a lot of gold and silver thread around the place. It’s detailed work and can be hard on the eyes after a few hours. We sit on the floor or at low tables mostly. The light has to be just right to see the patterns. You might see us hunched over a piece of fabric for a long time. It’s not a fast process. There is no big machinery here making things in a second. Everything is done by hand. We have bags of beads and spools of thread piled up in the corners. People come to us when they have something special they want decorated, like for a wedding or a festival. The smell of the old city is always there—spices and tea and dust. We take breaks to drink some water and talk about the news. It’s a traditional way of working that hasn't changed much over the years. Sometimes we have to rush to finish a piece by a certain date. It’s a quiet kind of work but it takes a lot of patience. We just keep our heads down and focus on the needle.