Villa Swagatam - Indo-French cultural residency program

Residency brief

Since 30 years, Vastrakala has been designing and manufacturing high-quality hand embroidery. As descendants of the master craftsmen serving the Nawabs of the Deccan over several centuries, these embroiderer craftsmen - and women - are the inheritors of a strong heritage seeped in traditional and millennial old techniques that they continue to pass down from one generation to the next. Initially dedicated to embroideries for interiors, Vastrakala’s repertoire progressively extended to fine embroidery for fashion as the company partnered with Lesage Paris. Both maisons have been united by the same passion, exchanging, meeting and bringing together their skills of excellence.

Transmission has always been at the heart of Vastrakala’s mission, whether it is in enabling new generations of embroiderers to perpetuate their heritage in and around the villages where they live, or in the exchanges of embroidery know-hows between France and India, two countries with a centuries-old embroidery tradition. Jean-Francois Lesage, the artistic director for the decoration activity will be the mentor of the residency, hosting the artist in his own studio during his/her stay. The resident will benefit from this unique accompaniment while learning from the ancestral techniques of Vastrakala’s craftsmen.

Our Space

Vastrakala Embroidery Atelier is located on the outskirts of Chennai, in the state of Tamil Nadu, close to Sriperumbudur, the ancestral home of Vastrakala’s craftsmen.

This new atelier was opened in March 2021 and designed as a modern manufacturer but in a way reminiscent of 19th-century French utilitarian architecture and industrial spaces. There, the residents will be living with the community of embroiderers and immerse themselves completely in the daily work at the studio.

Pauline Esparon

Designer

The residency will introduce me to a new technique, embroidery, and allow me to explore the scales, applications and materials involved. My interest in jute, a fiber grown mainly in India, will enable me to take the material out of its utilitarian connotations and unfold its decorative potential.

Pauline Esparon's work revolves around the notion of the “ brut ”, a form of archaism, a primary state of matter before its standardization by industry. Pauline Esparon plays with the primary form of materials, deconstructing the obvious uses and forms that often surround them. This approach is also contextual, questioning the cultivation of materials, their heritage, their survival, their system. In this way, each project expresses the wish for a more virtuous practice of design, and defines an alternative form of production by questioning poor materials, implementation techniques, and the perspectives of craftsmanship.

Vastrakala Craft Residency

Production residency

Residency brief

Our Space

Pauline Esparon

Past Laureates