Sittilingi is a valley in Dharmapuri, Tamil Nadu, where the Lambadi women have long carried a rich tradition of embroidery. After almost two generations of silence, two elder women, Neela and Gammi, began teaching the craft again in 2006. Their small group became Porgai, meaning pride. Today, around sixty women continue the practice alongside farming.
Postcards from Sittilingi is a collection inspired by a visit to the valley. Birds, tractors, fields, marigolds, chillies and kolams become motifs alongside the older Lambadi language of geometric forms and stepped borders. Cut in handloom cotton and stitched in Sittilingi by the Porgai women, each piece carries a small memory of a place, sent back through cloth.
