Dip En Dye

Working at Dip En Dye, right here at Rafi Marg 401 near the Delhi G P O, you get used to having colored stains on your fingers. It’s just part of the job when you’re dealing with fabrics and dyes all day long. The building is old, and you can feel the history of this part of Delhi every time you walk through the door. We spend most of our hours over the vats, watching the steam rise and making sure the colors turn out the way they’re supposed to. It’s a bit of a messy process, and the floor always has some splash of blue or red on it no matter how much we scrub. Being so close to the G P O means there’s always people rushing around outside, but inside here, things take as long as they take. You can't rush a good dye job. We have some old racks where the cloth sits to dry, and the smell of the shop is something you never really forget once you’ve been here. It’s a mix of damp fabric and the sharp scent of the dyes. We don't have any big presentations or fancy showrooms. People just bring us their stuff, we talk about what can be done, and then we get to work. It’s a simple trade, handed down and practiced every day in this small corner of Rafi Marg. We don’t overcomplicate things, we just focus on the color.