Textiles · Sindh
Ajrak: how Sindh's indigo-and-crimson cloth is made
In Sindh, an ajrak is what you give a guest you want to honour. Behind each one is weeks of printing, dyeing and washing, done by hand on both sides of the cloth.
An ajrak is a length of cotton, block printed and resist dyed by hand, usually in deep indigo and crimson with white and black picking out the geometric pattern. [1] In Sindh it does more work than any other cloth: it's given to guests as a mark of hospitality and respect, often with a Sindhi topi, and worn at weddings and cultural events. [1]
An old cloth
People in the lower Indus Valley grew tree cotton and made cloth from it thousands of years ago. The best-known sculpture from Mohenjo-daro, the "Priest-King" in the National Museum of Pakistan, wears a cloth over one shoulder with a trefoil pattern that many people see as an early relative of the ajrak. [1]
Where it's made
Ajrak is printed across Sindh, with production concentrated in Matiari, Hala, Bhit Shah, Moro, Sukkur, Kandiaro and Hyderabad, and there's a Saraiki variation in south Punjab. [1] The craft also crossed the border: printers moved from Sindh to Kutch, in today's India, where a village called Ajrakhpur still carries the name. [3] [1]
How an ajrak is made
Dawn described the traditional process as 21 stages. [2] These are the main ones:
- Washing and steaming. The cloth is cut and washed, coiled damp over a copper vat, covered with a quilt and left overnight. [2]
- The oil bath. It's soaked in oil pressed from Eruca sativa seeds, knotted into a bundle and left for two weeks so the oil gets into the fibres. Printers consider this stage crucial to the quality of the finished ajrak. [2]
- The outline. Carved wooden blocks print the outline of the design in a paste of lime, acacia gum and rice. A filler block stamps the areas that will end up black. [2]
- The mud resist. A paste called kharrh, made from rice paste, alum, molasses, fuller's earth, fennel and gum, is printed over everything that must stay white, black or red, to keep the indigo out. [2]
- The first indigo. The cloth goes into an earthenware vat of indigo. It comes out green and turns blue in front of you as the air reaches the dye. [2] [3]
- The river. The cloth is thrashed in the river until the gum and loose dye wash out, and camel dung is used to whiten the white areas. [2]
- The red. It's dyed with alizarin in a copper vat over a log fire, lifted and dipped again and again for a couple of hours until the red is right. [2]
- Drying on the riverbank. The cloths are spread on the banks and sprinkled with water as they dry, which bleaches the whites and deepens the other colours. [2]
- The last indigo and the finish. A second resist and a final indigo bath, then a last wash. The ajraks are folded while slightly damp and stacked, which presses them so well that they don't need ironing. [2]
What makes the best ajrak so hard to make is that it's printed on both sides. The printer works the dyes, mordants and resists on both faces of the cloth at once, and the patterns have to line up. [3]
How long it takes
Weeks, at least. The oil bath alone takes two. [2] A workshop in Bhit Shah, in Matiari district, said a complete batch takes around 40 days from start to finish, [4] and a fine double-sided ajrak can be months in the making. [3]
Natural or chemical dye?
The steps haven't changed, but natural dyes have been partly replaced by commercial ones. [2] Demand for cheap, fast fashion has pushed some production towards chemical dyes. [1] Both kinds are sold as ajrak, so it's worth asking.
Buying an ajrak: what we'd check
- Turn it over. On a double-sided ajrak the back carries the pattern too, lined up with the front. A pale or blank back means it was printed on one side only.
- Look for the hand. Block printing leaves tiny differences where one stamp meets the next. A perfectly even repeat often means a machine print.
- Ask where it was made, and by which workshop. A printer in one of the towns above, or a seller who can name one, is a good sign.
- Ask about the dye if natural dye matters to you, and expect a natural-dye piece to take longer to get.
Questions people ask
What are the colours of ajrak?
Traditionally deep indigo and crimson, with white and black outlining the geometric motifs.
How long does it take to make an ajrak?
Weeks. The oil treatment alone takes about two weeks in one account, and a Bhit Shah workshop described a full batch as taking around 40 days.
Is all ajrak made with natural dyes?
No. Dawn reported that natural dyes have been replaced to some extent by commercial ones, even though the steps are the same. If natural dye matters to you, ask the printer directly.
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