How many times do you hear someone say the world has gone crazy? I have always preferred to side on the positive. Determination has been my middle name, sometimes to my cost. However, when I look back over time, I become aware of the messages the universe sends me. They are highlighted in yellow paint, sunny and smiling. Well, this is one way of explaining coincidences that inspire me to write something and share it out there.
I look back at my Daadi Journey; there are small messages all over the space. My world becomes cloudy, and through the chaos emerge the reasons I do what I do and why.
Yesterday, I believe, came another message, like a knock on my door or a shake of my shoulders. Yes, yes, I hear what you are saying, not through a news channel or logical statements made from friends, but through my creative and open heart that says remember this message and analyse this, making words or a simple blog post.
The Daadi shop is a hub of creative people who have come together to share skills. Women have done this since time began: from sitting around kitchen tables to dictating fashion trends subconsciously, through repetitive stitches that tell stories.
Recently, we have been looking into ethnic styles based on some gorgeous fabrics that made their way to our workroom. Our volunteers got excited when they saw the colours and embroidery. The designs they came up with for tops, jackets, and bags were inspirational. I could sense the art about to emerge in our shop.
ill it be appreciated? Knowing our customers, they will notice it and hopefully wear it as a statement.
A statement. About what?
Back to yesterday.
A lovely lady brought in a bag of clothes for us to look at. She had found them in a house she had bought. It was heavy and what I pulled out made me gasp with delight. Why. Because I love anything made that is cultural.
The dress, I laid across the table and ran my hands over it. I knew instantly it was not the texture but the recognition. Feeling time layered into thread. In my mind I could see women who braved patience and intention. Their energy, greeting the work table at Daadi, where we also stitch and put the world to rights.
Where had this dress originated? AI to my rescue, and it tells me the dress is from Afghanistan. Threads stitched by someone's hands far away, carrying a story we shall probably never fully know.
Further details:
Vintage Afghan (often called a Kuchi or Banjara-style dress). Hand-embroidered bodice with gold thread, very typical of Afghan Pashtun styles. This is likely hand-dyed with delicate stitching. These dresses are usually worn for festivals, weddings, or cultural celebrations. We think it could be between 40–60 years old, maybe more. However, some more modern fabric has been inserted into the sleeves; it is hard to tell.
Now, to add to my excitement, there is a beautiful, heavy black cape, which I learned goes with the dress.
I’m intrigued. Are these dresses no longer made due to the political changes in Afghanistan?
Today, many of these traditional dresses are no longer seen in public, not because they have lost meaning, but because the space to wear them has changed. Now pushed behind closed doors, they are the unseen dresses.
The dress is telling me it is free. It has made its way to Daadi, and we are listening. It can be worn and seen again for whoever shares a voice, not as a costume but as culture. What we wear tells a story, and some stories will never be silenced. It has no label, no brand, only threads of hope, love, and pride.
It needs to be worn,
to move again,
to catch the light, to feel the air, the warmth, the life of a woman’s body. It is meant to live.
There is a woman somewhere behind closed doors who continues to use her voice as she stitches, because culture refuses to vanish.
It waits.
We are looking for between 50 and 60 euros for the dress and a further 35 euros for the black cape.