Medium rare

Are single-edition saris the ultimate flex for textile connoisseurs? VINITA MAKHIJA investigates.

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WARP AND WEFT In Swati Sunaina Gold's saris, centuries-old Banarasi textiles and techniques come with radical, unique interventions.

It all started with a wild goose chase in Banaras (Varanasi)," recalls Swati Agarwal. One half of the label Swati & Sunaina Gold, the designer traces the brand’s origin story back a decade ago when, inspired by her Marwari family’s trove of heirloom saris, she set out to find a rangkaat (a complex weaving technique that interlocks silk with zari threads) drape for her brother's wedding.

The search was obsessive—calls to President's Award-winning artisans, hours spent poring over Weaver Service Centre booklets, even a cold hunt through Varanasi’s bylanes. She never found the rangkaat she had dreamed of, but discovered a new calling instead.

In a landscape crowded with Banarasi brocade brands, Agarwal and her sister-in-law Sunaina Jalan have conjured up an anomaly. Their focus is the single-edition sari, which means no two patrons will ever own the same piece. Exclusivity is taken so seriously that they do not even maintain a physical archive of their actual creations (they do chronicle through sketches and samples). Each collection is a capsule of just six design directions, with 12 to 18 pieces in singular colourways. With pieces starting at ₹3 lakh, these are not impulse buys.