This textile was formerly known as Dhakai, named after the city of origin Dhaka in Bangladesh. Though this art form bloomed its popularity in the Mughal period. But the origin & its development as an industry is found in Kautilya's Arthashastra books in 3RD century BC & in the books of Periplus of the Eritrean Sea & in the accounts of ARAB, Chinese & Italian traders.
From various historical accounts, folklore & slokas, it has been found that the Jamdani designs & muslin in Bengal did not develop in a day. This fine fabric that used to be made at Mosul in Iraq was called "Moulin". In its 9th century book Silat-ut-Tawarikh Arab geographer Solaiman mentioned the fine fabric produced in a state which was called the old name of the current territory known as Bangladesh. This textile has been continuously praised and perfected from Megasthenes records of King Chandragupta's till Chinese historian Hieun Tsang. Abul Fazal's Ain-e-Akbari is the most recent one in them.
The excellence of cotton or Muslin Jamdani produced in Dhaka was raised to an art par excellence by Mughal patronage & achieved a uniqueness which has remained unparalleled among all handloom cloths all over the world. It has been the attire from Emperor Shahjahan to Emperor Aurangzeb & has been named as Mulmul khas & has been given many poetic names as Shabnam (evening dew) Sharbati (wine-like).
Incessantly right from my childhood I was quite fascinated & on the other hand loved the beautiful creations in the form of auspicious range of sarees owned & worn by my grandmother & my mother. Being a child, my eyes were full of curiosity & at the same time I used to envy the magnificent craftsmanship of Jamdanis & some other beautiful weaves from all corners of Bengal, however Jamdanis were always being my favourite. There upon being literally awestruck with the sheer beauty of these weaves, I was at times engulfed with the thought that how such magic gets created, to which my grandmother emerged as a saviour with a bag full of knowledge about the craftsmanship of these magical weaves from both parts of Bengal ( other part referred herein is Bangladesh ). My grandmother, being born and brought up in Dhaka Bangladesh which is the origin of Jamdani, I have grown up by listening to the stories of weaving of Dhakai Jamdani, which took all my attention & increased my passion towards Jamdanis. But soon my curiosity & fascination was short lived as I entered into the groove of life to be a part of the corporate world and becoming a part of the common rat race. However, while serving the corporate world , this fire or fascination of creating something with the magical weaves called Jamdanis and showcase these elegant, incomparable & exquisite weaves to the global audience stayed illuminated in the form of my dream deep inside me. Every time I went back home & wore my mother's Jamdani sarees or any other woven sarees from Bengal my inner instinct of fascination towards these weaves was slowly getting converted into my passion or desire of creating something new. On the other hand my grandmother being my constant motivation with her creativity of designing & creating on her own all kinds of everyday wear beautiful garments throughout her life. Due to lack of opportunities & being a homemaker my grandmother has held her dreams back, which has convinced me more to move forward in life with my passion or desires. So after 4 years of corporate stint & being constantly chased by my passion I finally decided to replace my profession with my passion which went to give birth to BAHI.
Bahi wants to celebrate the authenticity, uniqueness of the weaves of Bengal. Our creations will depict the beautiful tales of the artistic beauty of weaves and will showcase the epitome of love of Bengal. Bahi is a Sanskrit word which means beautiful, elegant & graceful. So we, house of Bahi wants to portray the journey of our weaves from yarn to some beautiful creations. It’s high time, Our world needs a sustainable environment, & fashion industry contributes a lot in terms of maintaining a sustainable, eco-friendly environment. So our focus is to maintain an eco-friendly environment & keeping in mind about the global warming we want to bring out some exquisite designs which are purely breathable, organic, eco-friendly, skin-friendly yet very fashionable & luxurious. We want to maintain a balance between the modern age & old times & bring back the authentic age old handwoven pattern with a flavour of modernity for our future generation.
