I just love visiting San Francisco Exploratorium for two reasons. It’s an inquiry-based learning, we discover how the world works through questions and answers. Additionally, having lunch in their sea-glass restaurant on patio, reflecting the dramatic natural surroundings, complementing the dynamic view of Treasure Island and the Bay Bridge. An outdoor seating at restaurant, that too overlooking the Bay on a sunny day, enjoying my favorite sushi is my definition of a day well spent. This restaurant had a unique item in their dessert menu….. a honey served in a honeycomb wafer. It intrigued me.
Honey! Exploring the world of honey is an eye-opening experience. Honey is so much more than just a sweetener, and should be lauded for all of the valuable properties it offers. For many people, their only experience with honey is the over-processed honey that’s sitting on the grocery store’s shelves in a cute little bear squeeze bottle or a glass jar with flowers on the label. In the modern world we are so used to eating honey from a pre-packaged bottle, we don’t even know how raw honey tastes. And to confuse further there is a raw honey, pure honey (pasteurized), Clover honey, Natural honey, Manuka honey & many more varieties. Basically, all honey comes from the same place, but labels reading raw, pure, and natural can get pretty confusing. Raw honey is typically pure and natural, but pure and natural honey isn’t always raw.
I feel exactly the same when I hear questions like, “what is a Raw silk? Or Ghicha silk? Or Matka silk?” These are not named after a town or a weave. These are the type of silks. In silk sarees, commonly known four silks are Mulberry, Tussar, Eri and Muga. They all originated from these same four silks. There are more silk varieties, and some are perfectly suitable for sarees as well. Raw silk is the one such widely used silk fabric in silk sarees for centuries.
Deep love needs deeper understanding. It all starts with getting to understand better. One question leads to another and soon we explore and learn much more.
Story of Silk: One of the oldest and finest fabrics in the world, raw silk has a history as lustrous as its fine threads. The history of silk can be traced back to the 27th century BC in China. According to the 27th century BC tale, the discovery of silk was an accident. It stated that Empress Leizu was having tea one day when a silk worm’s cocoon fell into her cup. In its attempt to get out, the thread of the cocoon began to unroll. So, the Empress thought of weaving the thread. The Yellow Emperor, encouraged his wife to study the life of silk worm, and so she learned the art of raising silk worms or what is called sericulture. Her entourage was taught as well and thus the advent of the silk industry. Silk is one of the oldest fabrics known to man.
From antiquity until the present day, silk has dominated not only fashion, but also history and politics. For a very long time, the Chinese kept silk as a secret from the rest of the world. The Chinese used silk for clothing, writing and during the Tang Dynasty, the color of the silk you wear signified one’s social rank class. Only in the last half of the first millennium BC the Silk Road or Silk Routes were opened across Asia, linking Mediterranean world as well as North Africa and Europe. At first countries such as India and Japan learnt the science of sericulture and soon joined in on the eastern monopoly of silk production. Processing techniques of silk – degumming and reeling, were taken from the Chinese technology, where silk was originally believed to be born.
Type of silk depends on 4 things: the species of silkworm, the tree whose leaves it eats, how its cocoon is processed into yarn and finally the technique by which the yarn is woven into a saree. India is the only country that commercially produces all four varieties of silk obtained from four types of moths. These are known as Mulberry, Tussar, Eri and Muga. Mulberry is also produced in other silk producing countries like China, Japan, Russia, Italy, South Korea etc., but Eri and Muga are produced only in India. The Tussar silk is often produced by the caterpillar of a wild silk moth that is found in rain forests of Bihar, Jharkhand, Orissa, Chhattisgarh, Madhya Pradesh, Andhra Pradesh and Maharashtra. Unlike mulberry silkworms, Tussar and Kosa silk (mainly produced in Chhattisgarh from a worm similar to silk worm) caterpillars are difficult to cultivate in captivity.
Once woven, silk is known by different names depending on the weave, style, design and place where it is woven.
Raw Silk (Noil Silk): Commonly known as “raw silk” is the most natural form of delicate fiber of silk with no twist and is unprocessed form of silk. Raw is a filament silk from which the gum one of the elements of silk has not yet been separated. Pure silk has had the gum removed. Raw is produced by coarse spinning process, it is small even and slightly bumped. Raw silk is a versatile fabric, has a matte surface and nubby rough finish, made from the short fibers left after combing and carding, feels soft against the skin, and usually lighter in weight than silk. It is easily distinguished from other types of silk for the subtle flecks on it, which are natural particles of the cocoon. It doesn’t shine like many other silk fabrics, are long-lasting and resists wrinkling. And that is its most distinguished feature, making it an obvious choice for traveling.
Raw silk, which is popularly known as ‘Paat’ in Eastern India, ‘Resham’ in Urdu and Hindu dialect, and ‘Pattu’ in the southern pockets of India, is the most natural form of delicate fiber which can get easily and smoothly woven into different fabrics and garments.
Pure raw silk sarees are highly sought after by the modern fashion enthusiasts from all around the world. Raw silk sarees, with its durability and shine, is the very basic form of saree and often undergoes other procedures so as to produce different types of awe-inspiring variations which enhance the quality and the essence of a garment. Muga raw silk sarees are known for retaining the texture and color throughout its lifespan. When it is spun, a golden based hue gets generated. Tropical Tussar raw silk has copperish hue in color. Mulberry raw silk is considered to be the softest and finest texture of all. Temperate Tussar raw silk are extremely popular, and also bears the similarities with Tropical Tussar silk. Eri raw silk sarees are pearly white in color and are rare and unique to find.
In its natural state, raw silk’s color ranges from light beige to yellow. When dying raw silk, it is very difficult to perfectly match the color samples, but this contributes to the uniqueness of the fabric. Each individual raw silk piece will have slight differences. About 97% of raw silk is produced in the five Indian states of Karnataka, Andhra Pradesh, Tamil Nadu, West Bengal and Jammu and Kashmir.
Now, some very interesting facts about raw silk,
- It takes about 10 kg of cocoons to obtain 1 kg of silk
- The strength of silk is equivalent to a metal wire.
Both Matka and Ghicha sarees are 100% silk, produced from ruptured cocoon filaments, much less expensive than the Raw silk or Tussar or Mulberry silk sarees. These recently references of names are misleading sales gimmicks as these are nothing but by products of silk.
Matka Silk: The wasteful remains of the Mulberry cocoon filament – gives Matka silk. The name ‘Matka’ or clay pot refers to the vessel where this waste is wound around or stored after removing the filaments for the Mulberry silk.
It is thinner, threads are shorter, not as lustrous yet maintains its sheen, a rough hand-loom silk fabric made from the waste Mulberry Silk (Bombyx Mori) without removing its gum (sericin) part, which results in some irregularities in the texture of the fabric. Matka silk resembles the tweed fabric in texture & sews easily. It is usually much less expensive.
It is largely obtained from the states of Karnataka and Kashmir but its spinning is done in the Malda and Murshidabad districts in West Bengal. Sujapur village in West Bengal, Islampur village in Bangladesh and Dariapur village in Gujarat are some of the well-known Matka silk producing villages .
Ghicha Silk (Assamese Gheecha or Khewa): Famous across east of India, Ghicha or Khewa are the names given to yarns that are remains from Assamese Eri silk or Tussar silk. Tussar, also known as ‘shantung’ is a type of wild silk, that is produced by silk- worms that feed on oak and juniper leaves since the worm is not grown in a controlled environment, the moth hatches from the cocoon and interrupts the filament length, resulting in short and coarse fibers, instead of long and lustrous ones. Ghicha is silken yarn obtained from cocoons which do not get included in the routine process of reeling in of Tussar silk directly from the cocoon. This could be due to the cocoon being pierced, cut or damaged in some sort of way which prevents natural reeling in. The cocoons are segregated and separately dealt with by pulling out threads slowly by hand and reeling onto earthen pots. This when spun gives a coarser to fine variety of fabric yarn though inferior to the Tussar Silk yarn. Some sources mention Ghicha as the portions which are unintentionally not dyed when Tussar silk is processed for the same.
Ghicha silk fabric is coarse, but surprisingly smooth to the touch. Ghicha has the same characteristics of cotton and yet it exuberates the lustrous silk sheen. These days Ghicha silk yarn is generally used as blend material with pure silk sarees or Katia Tussar silk or pure cotton sarees. Also, creative pairings can be found, such as some Tussar or Cotton sarees have pallu which are solely made in Ghicha silk fabric.
With amazingly intricate weave varieties, blended with palette of colors and distinctive motifs & designs, combined with redefining features of silk, linen and cotton fabrics, we make infinite possibilities for sarees.
It’s time to start exploring the tastes and benefits that come from using different types of honey. For curious readers full list can be found here. Considering that there are over 300 varieties of honey, I am sure to find one that I enjoy. But for sarees, I have realized that one will never have it all. The only one honey-colored raw silk saree that I have inherited drapes like a dream. For now, I am enjoying what I already have than desiring more.
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Pictures credited from Internet and courtesy of friends.
My Grandma's Legacy 