Phulkari Makers, Bassi Pathana
A collective of women embroiderers keeping the flowering-work of Phulkari alive, stitch by luminous stitch.
Communities & Artisans
The hands that carry the craft.
Meet the women artisans and collectives at the centre of everything we do.
Who Are Our Artisans
Keepers of a living language.
Our artisans are rural women of Punjab — many of them lifelong embroiderers of Phulkari, the luminous flowering-work stitched for births, weddings and homecomings. Their skill is inherited, not taught in schools; their knowledge is a language passed from mother to daughter across the frame of a wooden khes.
For too long, their embroidery travelled to markets while their names did not. Project Qala exists to change that arithmetic — restoring authorship, visibility and fair income to the women who make the work.
How We Walk Alongside
Three quiet revolutions.
01
Digital Literacy
From switching on a smartphone with confidence to making digital payments — the first steps toward an online livelihood.
02
Social Media Training
Turning a phone into a shopfront: photography, profiles and reaching buyers directly, without exploitative middlemen.
03
Financial Literacy
Costing craft fairly, understanding margins, and the confidence to name — and hold — a fair price.
Collectives
Rooted in place.
Women Artisan Network
An expanding network connecting artisans across villages to shared training, markets and each other.
Village Stories
Oral histories, field photography and journals that document craft as lived culture, not artefact.
“For the first time, people know my name, not just my work. I set my own price now.”
— Phulkari artisan, Bassi Pathana
“I learned to photograph my own embroidery. My daughter helped me post it. It sold in a week.”
— Member, Women Artisan Network
Field Presence
Bassi Pathana, Fatehgarh Sahib · Punjab, India
Our fieldwork is grounded in the villages of Punjab, where Phulkari is not heritage in a museum but a craft still stitched in living courtyards.
Field Photography