Shahbaz Dyeing Process

The workshop is located at 31 Antop Hill, over in the Harikrupa Society. We are right on Water Tank Road, and if you look across the street, you will see the Siddhivinayak Mandir. Being right opposite the temple means we hear the bells and the morning prayers while we are getting the vats ready. Dyeing is a messy business, there is no way around that. We have got various tubs and containers filled with different colors, and the floor is almost always a bit damp. You get used to the smell of the dyes and the steam after a while. It’s not the kind of place where you want to wear your nice clothes to work. We spend our hours making sure the fabrics take the color properly and drying them out when they are done. The water tank nearby is a huge landmark for anyone trying to find us. It’s a tight-knit society here, and everyone kind of knows what everyone else is doing. We don’t have any fancy marketing people or a big sales team. It’s just us doing the dyeing work as it comes in. Some days the humidity makes the drying take forever, and those are the long days where we end up staying late. We just do the work, pack things up, and get ready to start it all over again the next morning when the temple starts its rituals. It is just a steady routine of colors and cloth.