The Kodiyala weaves that once enjoyed royal patronage are seeing a revival courtesy the efforts of a project called Hosa Arambha.

It was a newspaper clip many years ago that had me drive into narrow dusty roads off the Bangalore-Mysore highway to look for a village called Kodiyala. My interest was piqued as this was a weaver community that had made saris during the time of Tipu Sultan that was continued to the Mysore royal family and even Indira Gandhi would wear these saris.

I have been to Kodiyala a couple more times, always making it a point to buy saris from the weavers and was pleasantly surprised to see a new revival project called Hosa Arambha. Translating to new beginnings in Kannada, this project took shape in November 2019 in collaboration with Shrenis Trust and the weavers. The brainchild of architect Kshitija Mruthyunjaya, this effort was part of her final year MA research project when she contacted Bangalore based The Registry of Sarees.

Currently textiles in Kodiyala are mostly bright colored sarees with motifs that are borrowed from other clusters. However there are no key references of what was woven before in the area to point out what was originally woven in Kodiyala. There were a lot of questions that revolved around what could have been produced then.

Read the full story that first appeared in Seema Magazine’s April 2021 issue here: