Historically, the Indian subcontinent has been a source of many unique and innovative textiles, famed and desired around the world. It is only chintz, however, that earned itself the tag of having ‘changed the world’.Â
Chintz, polished cotton of verdant foliage and leaves coloured in multiple rich hues, was unlike anything Europeans had known. Its lustrous beauty evoked visions of strange cultures and unknown lands.
International Quilt Study Centre and Museum
Chintz, also known as kalamkari, is a hand painted mordant and resist-dyed cotton from India that achieved such heights of perfection in beauty and was so coveted around the world that it was banned in parts of Europe, in fear that it would bring local economies to collapse. In France women wore chintz in the face of severe punishment, even death. The quest to imitate this cloth in Europe sparked technical innovations that ushered in the Industrial Revolution.
In a broad sense, chintz denotes an Indian patterned textile, typically made of cotton. The intricate patterns are achieved through a series of stages involving painting and/or printing, along with various dyeing, mordanting, and resist-dyeing techniques. Over time, industrial processes began to imitate these traditional methods. Kalamkari specifically refers to the hand-drawn and painted variations of chintz.
From a technical standpoint, both chintz and kalamkari describe the multi-stage process used to decorate a plain textile, although these terms are often used interchangeably for the finished textile itself. The process involves the application of materials using a wooden block or bamboo pen known as kalam. This application either directly dyes the textile, encourages dye adherence through a mordant such as alum, or inhibits dye absorption by applying a resist, such as wax.
Finding a way of describing the chintz process succinctly but accurately is a continuing problem. 'Painted cotton' has traditionally been used to differentiate chintzes from printed textiles, but to western readers this implies the use of a brush rather than the blunt-ended bamboo stick of the kalam or pen with which the outlines of the designs are drawn and the mordanted areas filled in. 'Painting' also suggests the direct application of colour, which is not a major feature of these textiles - it is the mordant that is applied with the kalam; the dyes, both red and blue, are applied by immersion in a vat, with only yellow (and occasionally indigo) being painted onto the surface where necessary.
Rosemary Crill
Senior Curator for South Asia, V&A Museum
The Beginnings: Pattachitra, Kalamkari & Chintz
Historically, this process of hand drawing on plain cloth was known as pattachitra: patta meaning 'cloth' and chitra meaning 'picture' in Sanskrit. This art form developed and evolved in the region of today's Andhra Pradesh, Tamil Nadu and Karnataka in South India around the 13th century. Later named the Coromandel Coast by the British, this region had centuries-old skills handed down to the local artists and dyers, as well as the source of the best red dye (chay root), abundant flowing water and ample, decomposing seashells provided a limitless source of calcium, used to fix dyes. This allowed the creation of vibrant and fast colours.
Originally used to create religious paintings on cloth to aid the acts of wandering minstrels and later used in Hindu temples, this craft then flourished as an art-form under the Golconda Sultanate and the Mughals. It was during this period in the 17th and 18th centuries that chintz achieved the pinnacle of perfection. The floral prints of this time were loosely based on Islamic art - arabesques and the Safavid art of Persia. The Islamic rulers who patronized this craft called the practitioners qalamkars , from which the term kalamkari evolved: qalam meaning 'pen', and kari meaning 'craftsmanship' in Persian. Created for a largely domestic market, the cloth was also exported to Southeast Asia, where it found particular popularity in the Thai Royal Court.
The word chintz initially appeared in the 17th century records of the East India Company; the word chintz originates from the Hindi word chint or chitta, meaning 'spotted' or 'variegated'. Meanwhile, the Portuguese, who were the first Europeans to encounter these textiles, called them pintado, meaning 'spotted'.
The Making of Chintz
Historically, chintz referred to plain weave, calico cotton that was hand printed, mordant- and resist-dyed in brilliant patterns of exotic birds, wildlife and flowers on neutral, light background. It required a lengthy process that could take many weeks and involved several separate dye baths using natural dyes, such as madder and indigo. The cloth was then usually burnished with a shell or beaten with wooden mallets to give it a lustrous, glazed surface.
The laborious craft of chintz requires the fabric to undergo 17 meticulous steps. From a young age, the children of master craftsmen apprenticed to learn a single, specialized function and become skilled artisans. From making the kalam to treating the cloth, to printing and washing, approximately 8 to 10 craftsmen are involved in creating each yard of fabric.
Following is a shortened description of the chintz process as it was described in the 18th century by several European traders, botanists and missionaries, and detailed in Chintz, Indian Textiles for the West by Rosemary Crill.
First, plain cotton cloth was procured. The cloth would have been woven in one of the many weaving villages in the Coromandel hinterland, although the cotton yarn itself would probably have been brought from other parts of the Deccan plateau, since locally cultivated cotton was not of sufficiently high quality to produce the fine fabric needed for these premium export textiles. The raw cotton was brought by bullock cart from north of Hyderabad, some 300 miles away, to the Coromandel area by traders belonging to the Banjara community.
The cloth was first partially bleached and steeped in a solution of water, buffalo milk and myrabolan fruit. The fatty buffalo milk ensured that the mordants did not seep beyond the required areas when applied to the cloth; the astringent myrabolan reinforced the action of the mordant. The cloth was dried and smoothed by beetling (beating with wooden mallets) and the design was drawn on the smoothed surface with charcoal. This may have been transferred from a paper design onto the cloth by means of pouncing - dusting powdered charcoal through perforated lines - or by means of a stencil, or an outline printed with fugitive colour (fig. 1).
The outlines of the areas to be coloured red in the finished textile were then painted with an alum mordant solution with a kalam (bamboo pen) and those to be black with an iron mordant. The cloth was then boiled in a solution of chay root, a source of red dye. The iron mordant reacted with the myrabolan to produce fast black lines (fig.2), while the alum reacted with the chay to produce red (fig.3).
The cloth had then to be prepared to receive the red dye. It was washed and bleached repeatedly with dung, then steeped again in myrabolan and buffalo milk. Any white lines that were to be reserved against a red background were drawn in with wax. The alum mordant, lightly tinted with sappan wood to make it visible to the painter, was then applied with the kalam. The cloth was subsequently immersed in a vat containing a hot solution of the red dye from the chay root, which would colour only those areas that had been treated with alum mordant (fig.4).
When the cloth was thoroughly soaked with the red dye, it was removed and washed, bleached in a dung bath and washed again repeatedly over four days.
The cloth was then covered in beeswax, except for those areas to be blue in the finished textile (fig.5). The waxed cloth was left in the sun to melt the wax just enough for it to penetrate to the reverse of the cloth.
The cloth was subsequently handed over to a specialist indigo dyer, who immersed it in an indigo vat for about an hour and a half to produce the blue areas (fig.6). The wax was removed by boiling the cloth in water - although it would have become blue, this wax could nevertheless be reused on another textile.
Some chintzes, especially those of the earlier period, have small areas of indigo dye that appear to have been applied directly to the surface of the cloth rather than resist-dyed. This has been a contentious issue, with some authorities claiming that the technology required to do this existed only after the invention of the orpiment vat in Europe in the eighteenth century. The evidence seems clear, however, that surface painting of indigo with a brush did occur in India before the eighteenth century.
Green highlights, especially for leaves, were achieved by over-painting a solution of myrabolan gall over the indigo-dyed areas (fig.7). Since yellow dyes are notoriously fugitive, it is rare for these to survive in early chintzes. When all the stages of dyeing, rinsing and bleaching were completed, the cloth was prepared for sale by starching, beetling and polishing with a shell ('chanking') to produce a glossy surface.
Later on, block printing was used to expedite the painting process, and finally chintz also came to refer to the industrially printed textiles produced in England, as well as floral printed ceramics and wall paper.
" Of all the remarkable textile traditions that India has bestowed on the world, its printed and painted cotton textiles, popularly known as chintz, have arguably had the longest and greatest global impact."
Sarah Fee, Senior Curator, Royal Ontario Museum
Chintz as a Trade Commodity
Chintz was manufactured in India as block printed, painted or stained calico (calico being predominantly produced in the South of India) and first exported to the Middle East and South East Asia. The first samples came to England, France and The Netherlands in small quantities via early Dutch and Portuguese traders in the 16th century.
By the 17th century, English spice traders found chintz to be a valuable trade commodity (textiles have long been one of the most useful trade items - just think of the Silk Road!). When they began importing the fabric into England, they found an even greater market for the textile. "Chintz, polished cotton of verdant foliange and leaves coloured in multiple rich hues, was unlike anything Europeans had known. Its lustrous beauty evoked visions of strange cultures and unknown lands." The print was bright and colourfast, the pattern exotic, and the cotton - which was new to the west, was highly desirable in itself. It was far superior to anything produced in Europe at the time and there was an immediate demand.
Soon, it was textiles rather than spices which came to dominate British-Indian trade. Queen Mary was known to have decorated her bedroom with these cottons, and by 1680, more than a million pieces of chintz were exported to England per year, with a similar number exported to France and The Netherlands. Chintz became extremely popular as bed covers, curtains and draperies for the rich.
Recognizing the potential for profit in importing Indian chintz, the shrewd directors of the East India Company were quick to understand the necessity of aligning designs with the prevailing taste in England. This taste, influenced by a prevailing fondness for all things Chinese, prompted them to send patterns and instructions to Indian artists as early as 1643. Orders from Europe took on a hybrid "exotic" style blending the vivid hues of traditional Indian colours with designs that seamlessly wove together elements from English embroidery, Islamic florals, and the intricate patterns found on Chinese ceramics.
The irresistible charm of these vivid, colorfast fabrics found immense popularity, offering a visual spectacle unseen in the West. In contrast, the painted and printed fabrics from England during that era primarily featured linen cloths adorned with insoluble colors, paling in comparison to the resplendent hues of Indian textiles. As Edward Baines, a British MP and newspaper editor, eloquently expressed in the 18th century, the invasion of these exotic fabrics was nothing short of a transformative takeover: "it crept into our houses, our closets, and bedchambers; curtains, cushions, chairs, and at last beds themselves were nothing but calicoes or Indian stuffs."
From the Bedroom to the Wardrobe
Many of the earliest Indian chintzes were crafted with a specific purpose – as opulent bed hangings rather than conventional wall hangings. Alongside quilts, these textiles were ordered in substantial quantities, contributing to the boom in England during the late 17th century. This period not only witnessed a surge in demand but also laid the groundwork for the enduring legacy of Indian chintz in European homes.
When the fabric was worn out, it was given to servants who recycled it into clothing. The beauty of the prints and the comfort of the cotton quickly caught on, and soon upper class ladies were using chintz first as lining, and then for their entire wardrobe. The original large floral prints were revised into smaller, delicate patterns more suitable for clothing. Daniel Dafoe is quoted as protesting over "persons of quality dress'd in Indian carpets."
Espionage, the Death Penalty & Trade Wars
Indian chintz, with its vibrant patterns and complex dyeing techniques, posed a significant threat to European textile industries in the late 17th and early 18th centuries. Unable to replicate the intricate craftsmanship, European wool and silk manufacturers feared the rise of this exotic import. In England, this competition sparked riots and even attacks on ships carrying Indian chintzes. The disruption led France and England to impose strict bans on the import and use of chintz, aiming to protect their local industries. In France, women wearing chintz faced severe penalties, even death.
To counter the dominance of Indian textiles, industrial espionage played a role. In 1742, a French missionary working in India smuggled the secrets of chintz-making back to Europe. This knowledge fueled the development of mechanized cotton spinning, weaving, and commercial roller printing in European mills. With these innovations, Europe began producing its own chintz-like fabrics. By 1759, the ban on chintz was lifted, but the industrialization of production in Europe had already diminished demand for Indian-made chintz.
Throughout the next century, European-made chintz gained immense popularity, as mills developed their own prints and patterns. Over time, the term "chintzy" became associated with anything overly common or abundant, reflecting the fabric's widespread availability.
The 17th century marked a tumultuous era in the textile industry as Indian chintzes ignited political and economic unrest. Alarmed by the influx of these vibrant and highly sought-after fabrics, England's wool and silk manufacturers responded with riots and protests, fearing the erosion of their markets. The mounting competition drove British weavers to drastic measures, including attacks on ships transporting these prized Indian cottons, heralding the beginning of what became known as the chintz crisis.
The chintz crisis also saw legislative interventions in England. The Calico Acts of 1701 and 1720 aimed to protect domestic wool and silk industries by restricting imports of Indian chintzes. The second act went further, prohibiting their household use while allowing English-produced chintz for export. The import of printed Indian chintz was permitted for re-export, navigating a delicate balance between protectionism and global trade, until they were repealed in 1774. By then, British textile innovations had enabled the production of affordable cotton fabrics, weakening India's dominance in the market and leading to the gradual decline of its chintz industry.
After India’s independence in 1947, traditional crafts, including block printing, were revived through government programs and global appreciation for handmade goods. Indian block-printed fabrics found a new life, especially in home décor and soft furnishings, captivating modern audiences with their intricate designs and cultural richness.
Today, Indian chintz, kalamkari and block prints are celebrated not just for their beauty but also for the resilience and ingenuity they symbolize. These fabrics, whether adorning a sofa, hanging as curtains, or worn as an item of clothing, carry a legacy of craftsmanship and a deep connection to history and the struggles of Indian artisans.
Kalamkari Today
Today in India, kalamkari art is characterized by two distinct styles: the Machilipatnam style, also known as Pedana Kalamkari, and the Srikalahasti style.
Pedana Kalamkari involves the block-painting of fabric using vegetable dyes. This art form is practiced in Pedana, a town in Andhra Pradesh. The Srikalahasti style of kalamkari employs a kalam (bamboo pen) for freehand drawing, with meticulous coloring done entirely by hand. This style thrived in temples, contributing to the creation of unique religious identities. It is prominently featured on scrolls, temple hangings, chariot banners, as well as depictions of deities and scenes from Hindu epics such as the Ramayana, Mahabharata, and Purana. The present recognition of this style is attributed to Kamaladevi Chattopadhyay, the inaugural chairperson of the All India Handicrafts Board, who played a key role in popularizing this intricate art forming the 1950s after it nearly died out.
However, while historical chintz/kalamkari was identified by the process, today's cloth is identified more by the aesthetic, and so many industrially produced textiles, such as digital prints in chemical dyes on synthetic textiles - the absolute antithesis of the traditional cloth! - are also sold under the name kalamkari. Those traditional artisans who continue to practice the entirely hand crafted method of production are few, and some skills and materials - such as the use of chay to create the vibrant red colour, or the use of wax resist to create very fine white lines inside designs -are no longer in use.
At House of Wandering Silk, we partner with Dwaraka, a Srikalahasti-based women's cooperative of kalamkari painters. As it has been done for centuries, each fabric is drawn by hand with a kalam using exclusively natural dyes, mordants and resists. Our Kalamkari Collection is deeply rooted in the past, with a playful aesthetic designed for the present. I think it's just magical that today we can adorn ourselves with textiles that continue an ancient, unchanged tradition!
In Spring, we shot our Kalamkari Collection in the Srikalahasti workshop where our textiles are created.
Sources
Chintz, Indian Textiles for the West, Rosemary Crill
Cloth that Changed the World: The Art and Fashion of Indian Chintz, Sarah Fee