Decide what kind of life you actually want, then say NO to everything that isn’t that-BOB PROCTOR
Hello All, I am taking this opportunity to introduce my brand, Wither. Firstly, today we have completed 1 month on this glorious journey of creating clothes that we love. Secondly, celebrating these cards as I have my name on them as a “Creator” is a BIG deal for me.
I was raised in Bengaluru city in a conservative family, & currently live in the suburbs. I am in my 30’s, not married (you will know why I am mentioning this in a minute) My educational qualification is BCA, MBA because parents, cousins & their friends thought it had scope. Since I was a little kid, I knew I was an artist & was very clear to pursue my career in Art, Dance & Social Work. Again, these don’t have a scope so I had to study something that had scope. This landed me in a job in Supply Chain, I worked in 3 different corporate companies for 6.3 years.
I never liked any of these jobs, I was a robot waking up every morning, sitting in front of a computer, get back home, sleep, have fun during weekends. Repeat. I leapt, quit this job in the year 2016. Travelled, freelanced, worked in remote jobs, started a blog, wrote my heart out. But, in India, making money with freelancing isn’t easy. So I took up a fixed job in a remote place. 2018-2020 I worked in a school that educated Tribal children. My creativity started getting wings here. I worked with artists, I enjoyed reading books to children, I invested time in developing my skills with drawing, dancing, writing and reading too. When I was getting close to completing 2 years, I wanted to leave and travel for a bit so I quit in 2020.
Inevitable happened, Covid happened. I had to return home. Apart from being curious about knowing unknown places while travelling, I was staying away from family because, I was tired of explaining to the family that “getting married” is not the only thing a girl aspires to be, as per them only job a girl can do best is in the kitchen & by marrying someone. The goals, dreams, aspirations of a girl should all go in the drain, first of all, they should not even have them.
After I returned home, I looked up jobs that would fill my Artistic quench, I barely found any. 2 jobs came my way, both took work from me and never paid. Everything happens for the good they say.
On Feb 13th 2021, the second job that didn’t pay me bothered me a lot. I couldn’t sleep that night, I was watching videos of @zerowastedaniel over & over, who had inspired me a few years ago from a post I saw through the only friend in Fashion in know @madamtapoool. About 2 years ago, with a help of a colleague whose mother was a tailor, I had designed a skirt using old dupattas and left-overs his mother had from her work. We couldn’t take it forward back then, that kept ringing in my head to take it seriously this time.
That night, there was some force pushing me to start the same idea. The name “Wither” just came out of nowhere, I named it in Kannada too as “ಉದಿರು”. “If a piece of cloth is withering, doesn’t mean it’s waste, it can have a life too. The next day, I wrote this all down & I knew I had to push it to achieve it. I set a target to launch in April, & now here we are. The fun part was, I kept writing the name Wither on paper every day, one of the day’s I realized “Her” being part of the word.
It has not been an easy journey for me as a woman to follow “my way”, also not being married adds ghee to fire in a conservative family. It’s a fight every day, it still is. There is hardly any support from the close family members, as they still believe, being an entrepreneur is not for women. I have seen my friends struggle, I have seen married women struggle, while their husbands say what they have to do. This can go on, I will stop here to just say the intention behind the name “Wither” has a strong connection to raise women along with me.
My mother was a tailor, a passionate one. Neither do I have a professional fashion degree, but have a passionate one. She did go for professional classes but she never took it up as a business. I grew up seeing her stitch clothes to me and for herself, she made use of every single waste piece that was left out to create something else. She always indulged herself by creating masterpieces using wires, gunnysacks, woollen threads. And she had fun dressing me up all the time.
She had a very big influence on me with my style of dressing and my passion for clothes. Only if society, let her do her work passionately. She would have conquered the world. This also had an impact on me, on how being married will kill your dreams. No woman should stop themselves from achieving their dreams because of societal norms. That’s my goal to communicate through clothes.
The creator side
I am learning Bharatanatyam, I practice sketching sometimes, I love writing (now you know why my posts are long) and reading, I am a foodie & I love to cook. A nature lover can trade anything in life to live in a forest(future goals), I can watch birds, animals, sky, stars for hours without talking. I am keen to know what’s beyond our planet, the infinite space. I love constellations, and love watching movies and documentaries related to space. I love researching, that helps me learn something new every day from something old (Did you know series? This is why) I am a movie buff, lately I have been drawn towards documentaries. If not for Covid, I had big plans to work in the movie industry. The launch video was conceptualised & directed by me (a show-off) I have extreme levels of OCD, that I am taking advantage of to get my work to be perfect. As a person, I push myself to be a better person than I was yesterday. As a brand, I have the same principles to bring in the best quality.
The card says “Creator” and not “Founder” because I have found my passion, all I have to do is to “Create”.
Thank you all for supporting this journey so far, we have a long long long way to go.
Lastly, These are “Seed paper cards” made by @dopolgy. Thank you for making these cards & also for being a part of this journey.
Follow @_wither_wither_ on Instagram to see more of my creations.
Blooming…
Wild Flower
Yours Consciously Sneha 