Talking about the inspiration for her range of high quality silk scarves, Miss Kiki explains “I first came up with the idea at London Printworks Trust. Textile designer Robert Burton and I were screen-printing his artworks onto silk for a fashion collaboration. It occurred to me then that reproducing artworks on silk in a way that people can wear and so engage with art was an obvious thing to do. When I mentioned this to our close friend Mark Timmins – Director of Fashion at Heriot Watt School of Textiles and Design – he mentioned Zika Ascher to me.

“I did my research and discovered that his story mirrored ours in that he worked with leading artists to create collections of silk panels, and then went on to extract and abstract art onto lengths of fabrics, which he then sold on to couture houses. That is exactly what we had planned to do, so the Ascher’s story provided the perfect backdrop to ours.”

The six different scarf designs will be lovingly produced by the artist and textile designer Robert Burton who regularly collaborates with some of London’s most exciting fashion designers and who designs sublime silk dresses inspired by his own artworks. They will be limited to a run of 50 and will be available only through carefully selected retailers and venues. Every panel will come with an exquisitely designed card telling the story behind the design and giving contact details of its creator.

The collection is aimed at those who love art and who have their own sense of identity and uniqueness. Ultimately, Kiki hopes that each panel will become a treasured and high valued celebration of extraordinary talent.

So are the silk panels art or fashion or even both? Kiki explains “To me the scarves are works of art and I want people to engage with them exactly as they wish to. I wear mine around my neck; singer Gabby Young ties hers together to make a shoulder-piece; we pin them together to make dresses. Our art muse – Stav B – uses them in her performances. Some hang them on their walls.

“In 1947, the great poet and art critic Sacheverell Sitwell wrote (of the Ascher concept): ‘A scarf is, admittedly, not a tapestry, not a dress; it is a mere square of silk or some other material intended to be worn around the head. But it can be treated as a work of art. It can be collected like a rare book or print.’ This is how I see it too.”

Buy the scarves online here

If you visit Varanasi, the cultural capital of India, you will experience the mystic hustle and bustle of pilgrims and slow-moving boat wallahs on the banks of the ochre-hued River Ganges. Yet, alongside the commotion is a vast peace of silk emporiums, a token tribute to an age old slow tradition of community weaving within the region that once clothed the Indian Maharajas and the Dalits (low caste) alike.

For 1,000 years, weavers willingly surrendered themselves in spiritual reverie to the quality-focused techniques of hand-looming within the city’s twisted alleyways, where kilometres of refined, luxurious thread would hang forth and feed the streets.

The silk, sometimes created in a co-operative partnership between two weavers, would be opulently embroidered with gorgeous motifs of myth and nature such as marigolds, swans and griffins through binary systems (perhaps the origin of computer’s today) and often enhanced with gold or silver (zari) thread.

Oscar de la Renta once commented that, ‘”Silk does for the body what diamonds do for the hand.”

However the fast pace of modern life, the adoption of mass production and the acceptance of “poor-quality, cheap machine-silk has substantially impacted the brocade craft and its unique results.

“Many looms are lying silent today and many have even been sold off. As the traditional sari has been pushed to a side of the wardrobe of the modern woman, so have these weavers been pushed to the fringe of their community.”

This lost craft has erupted into discord for the 150,000 remaining weavers, forcing them into a vulnerable life of unemployment, who often migrate to hard labour away from their skill and home.

Yet there is hope of revival through The Varanasi Weavers Project, which is re-training weavers and bringing the old craft up-to-date and making commercially viable. Moving away from the myriad spectacle of colours, the collection offers Western sophistication with classic colours of blacks and natural shades, while entwining clean-cut contemporary designs with the traditional aesthetic in order to make it more desirable.

The famous Varanasi embroidered “Zardosi” buttons crafted by village women, that has been long-applauded for its fashion finesse is also being revitalized, while the pure silk fabric has also been made lightweight, colour-fast and machine washable.

“We believe that these weavers have magic in their fingers; they are not asking for pity.”

Showcased to audiences at the Ethical Fashion Show in Paris in Autumn 2008, it is hoped that the project, of which now encompasses 60 weavers working in three Dalit villages around the city, can expand its aesthetically-charming and socially vital grassroots industry.

Photos:  Varanasi Weavers Project