Cotton and Wool Blend Shawl with Printed Diamond Motifs, "Indigo Diamonds"

"We come from the beautiful city of Dehradun in Uttarakhand. We are life partners who have come together to share a journey into the realm of textile arts, a field we both love. Pathik was born in 1986 and Yojana was born in 1987.

"We were always attracted to arts and crafts, but the turning point in our life was the four years dedicated to our design school. Handloom weaving was one subject of our curriculum taught by a respected faculty member who inspired us to work with weaving. Interacting with artisans also taught us many things.

"Both of us studied textile design at the Indian Institute of Crafts and Design in Jaipur. After graduating, we worked as freelancers on government projects with craft communities. The drawback with these projects was that the artisans were only given work during the project; after its completion, there was no follow-up for new orders. As responsible textile designers, we decided to start working with them throughout the year. We always had loved our country's varied craft skills, which gave us a reason to master at least one of them.

"With hard work and dedication, we now have a workshop of our own with 20 or 25 artisans who collaborate with us. We dream of forming an organization that aims completely for ethical and fair trade to carry on the artisan legacy from generation to generation.

"We teach our team new techniques to keep a constant and progressive pace with the changing market. We primarily work with pure wool and use cotton or silk in wool blends.

"Wool is difficult to work with. We obtain the materials through local vendors and try to develop new kinds of yarns by blending two different materials. Our favorite aspect of our craft is that the interlacing of the fabric is done with human effort, with love. As our art is time-taking and requires a lot of human effort, producing our textiles in large quantities is a challenging task which we try to accomplish.

"We are inspired by the natural beautiful of Uttarakhand near the foothills of the Himalayas or 'Dev Bhumi.'

"It's a great feeling to actually pursue what you always dreamed of. When passion becomes your career, what better could you ask for? We love what we do and it is our passion and determination that continue to encourage and motivate us.

"We are life partners who also share a work space. Pathik manages all the work related to production and marketing and Yojana takes care of design execution. Our artisans are hardworking, dedicated and ready to adapt to the changing scenario.

"We have participated in many artisan fairs and festivals.

"The artisans — especially the women artisans — become self sufficient and gain a lot of self confidence, which makes them face challenges without fear. We see the beautiful smiles when artisans are satisfied with their livelihood, and this satisfies us the most.

"With a limited amount of capital, we made a tough decision at a young age to support others' livelihoods along with ours, which was the most difficult phase of our life. There is still a long way to go, but whatever we have accomplished and the support we could provide to our craft community make us feel proud. We are very thankful to Novica for providing us global exposure."