Ajrakh has always been a textile of patience: a laborious, multi-step resist-printing craft from Kutch, passed down through generations, with its signature geometric motifs carved on wooden blocks and dyed with natural pigments. In Sanya Malhotra’s latest promotional look, the craft found contemporary rhythm through Nitya Bajaj’s design.

The ensemble was crafted in raw silk: an Ajrakh Tilak embroidered lehenga in rust tones, layered with zari and gold sequin hand embroidery, paired with a semi-precious ruby-encrusted half-sleeved choli with a plunging neckline and a tie-up detail at the back. Anchoring it was a matching sequin dupatta edged with the house’s signature scallop border. The interplay of gilded detailing with earthy base tones offered a striking push-pull between ornamentation and rooted craft.

Known for its laborious, multi-step process that relies on natural dyes and organic methods, Ajrakh yields fabrics that are both environmentally conscious and visually rich. Its motifs, engineered through hand-carved blocks, are signatures of the cluster, with patterns like the Badami jaal—leaf-like motifs in running repeats—forming some of the craft’s most recognisable expressions.

Nitya Bajaj has made Ajrakh her design language, sourcing directly from these clusters and translating the textile into silhouettes for a contemporary audience. While the fabric is often seen in cotton or modal, Bajaj reinterprets it in raw silk and sequins, creating lehengas, blazers, kaftans, shararas and even swimwear.