How to look after an aari work blouse

A properly worked bridal blouse should still look correct in ten years. Most do not, and almost never because of the embroidery.

They are ruined in storage.

1. Never store it in plastic

This is the one that does the damage. A plastic cover traps humidity against the fabric, and in a coastal district that humidity is salt-laden. Zari tarnishes, silk yellows along the folds, and stones lift as whatever they sit on degrades.

Store it in cotton. An old cotton saree, a pillowcase, a plain cloth bag - anything that breathes. If the blouse came home in a plastic cover, take it out the same week.

2. Dry clean, do not wash

Water and hand embroidery do not get along. Washing loosens the tension the design was worked at, lifts stone settings, and dulls zari permanently.

Take it to a dry cleaner and tell them there is hand work on it, so the piece is not pressed flat over the embroidery. If a stain needs attention, point at it rather than letting anyone treat the whole garment.

3. Never iron over the work

If the blouse must be pressed, turn it inside out, put a clean cotton cloth between the iron and the fabric, and work around the embroidery rather than across it.

A hot iron on zari flattens the thread and takes the light out of it, and the light is the entire point of zari. This cannot be undone.

4. Fold it with the work facing out

Counter-intuitive, but right. Folding with the embroidery inside presses stone and zari against itself, and against the fabric underneath, for however many months it sits in the cupboard.

Better still, do not fold across the embroidery at all. Roll the blouse around a length of soft cloth, or fold along a line that misses the worked areas.

Refold it differently once a year. A crease that sits in the same place for a decade becomes permanent.

5. Keep it away from perfume and deodorant

Spray before dressing, not after. Alcohol-based sprays dull metallic thread on contact, and the mark shows most on exactly the areas you would notice - the shoulders and the upper chest.

The same applies to hair spray during a wedding morning. Get the hair done first.

6. Travelling with it

Carry it flat if you can, rolled if you cannot, and never packed under anything heavy. If it is going in a suitcase, put it on top and lay a cotton cloth over it.

For a wedding, take it out of the bag the moment you arrive and hang it. A blouse that spends two days compressed in a case arrives with creases in the worked areas that will not fall out by themselves.

If something does come loose

A thread pulling or a stone coming away is repairable, and much more repairable early than late.

Do not cut a pulled thread. On chain-stitch work, one cut thread can release a run of stitches. Ease it back gently, or leave it alone and bring the blouse in.

Bring it back to whoever worked it, if you can. Matching somebody else's thread, stone and tension is harder than working the design in the first place, which is why a repair by a stranger is often visible.

What this is really about

Hand work is bought once and worn for years. The blouse from a wedding gets worn again at somebody else's wedding, and eventually by a daughter. The difference between a blouse that survives that and one that does not is almost entirely a cotton bag instead of a plastic one.

If you have a piece that has already tarnished or lost stones, it is often worth bringing in to look at rather than replacing. There is more about that kind of work on the saree and blouse page.