Waistcoat Nearly Finished

I have nearly finished tweaking a waistcoat for the first collection. The lining is the 'exploded' Khyber Pass design I posted about earlier, the buttons are horn and the cut is close to the traditional Pakistani 'waskit'. Here it is modeled by the devastatingly handsome Alex Robertson during our trip to the Hindu Kush last month. He is flanked by a jeep driver of immense skill and Zar Wali Shah our guard, who was a very nice guy and also a great dancer...

Khyber Lining

I have been working on a lining which uses elements of a drawing I made  about 3 years ago of the Khyber Pass. The Khyber Pass links Afghanistan and Pakistan, in fact it is a bit far South to count as the Hindu Kush. However, it is iconic, so I have included it. The trucks which wind slowly along its narrow road are the same wonderfully decorated vehicles which wheeze up and over the Lowari Pass carrying our cloth out of Chitral and into the rest of the world. Below is an overall view of the lining
and some details.

Lining Shots

I have been working on an over-shirt made from shu wool and lined with my snow leopard and markhor chase fabric. The cut isn't finalised, but I here are some images I just took of the lining.

Map of Chitral Lining

After the floral exuberance of my previous lining, I have been experimenting with a more prosaic lining. My new lining takes the highest peaks and passes of Chitral and lays them out in a design which is reminiscent of a star chart. I have produced a dark and a pale version...

A New Lining

Over the weekend I have been working on a waistcoat lining. The design is not quite finished, but the drawing is, so I have posted it below. As you can see I have gone for a Mughal style composition squashed into the form of a Paisley pattern. So far so good, but if you look closer you will see that I have subverted it with all sorts of computer cables, satellite dishes and -perhaps too obviously- an ipad. What I am trying to get across is rather contradictory: The story behind the wool I use and the imagery in my linings and labels, focuses on a romantic ideal of the Hindu Kush: high mountains, rugged hospitable people and timeless, pre industrial crafts. All this is true, but I am only able to bring it together and sell it to a Western market because of communications technology. People in Chitral may lead lives steeped in tradition, but they also text and tweet and send facebook messages, that's how I can do business with them from the other side of the world.

With some colour added...

The Development of a Lining

The linings of Hindu Kush jackets tell you something about where our remarkable wool comes from. The lining below has developed around the idea of two of the most mysterious animals of the Hindu Kush mountains, the snow leopard and its prey the markhor (an endangered species of ibex). Both creatures are extremely rare, the snow leopard is internationally famous, but fewer people know of the markhor. However, to the Kalasha people of the Hindu Kush, markhor are sacred. For the Kalasha, markhor are the purest of creatures since they are herded by the spirits of the mountain tops high above the polluted world of men and women. 

                             

     The famous snow leopard / ibex chase from the BBC's Planet Earth series, shot in the Hindu Kush.

Images to be reproduced only with the permission of Hindu Kush ltd.