Forbes India 30 Under 30 2025: Brinda Dudhat's Morii Design restores pride for craft in artisans

Morii collaborates with over 165 women artisans from 12 villages across India, combining techniques such as Sujani embroidery from Bihar, Bela block printing, and Rabari embroidery with contemporary abstract designs from Kutch and Kantha embroidery from West Bengal

By Benu Joshi Routh

Published: Feb 11, 2025 01:40:58 PM IST

Updated: Feb 13, 2025 05:32:41 PM IST

Brinda Dudhat, Co-founder, Morii Design Image: Amit Verma; Directed By: Kapil Kashyap

A semester exchange programme in 2015 at Tama Art University in Tokyo, Japan, brought Brinda Dudhat, a student of the National Institute of Design (NID), her first exposure to art as a form of self-expression.

At NID, a course in environmental perception helped her appreciate the village life, and later, the craft documentation course with the pastoral nomadic Rabari community in Kutch, Gujarat, further stoked her interest in the villages and their crafts.

But the turning point came in 2018 while working on a World Bank-funded project with South Asia’s pioneering scenographer and design guru Rajeev Sethi, designing a collection to revive the marginalised craft of Sujani embroidery in Bihar, in collaboration with the artisans.

At the end of that project, at an exhibition in Delhi, her collection was greatly appreciated and received many inquiries, some asking if she had a brand. “That was the first time I got the confidence that if I do something, it can work,” says Dudhat.

In the summer of 2019, riding on her two-wheeler in the scorching heat, 40 kilometres away from Bhuj, Dudhat went from village to village requesting the Jat embroidery artisans to work with her. She was initially met with resistance, but after two weeks of persuasion and convincing, the women agreed to team up with her. “It was a difficult negotiation, but it worked because I promised them sustainable livelihoods with fair wages.”

Later that year, with her friend Sonu Yadav’s support, Dudhat registered Morii Design working with 10 to 15 women artisans creating hand-embroidered cushions, bed covers and jackets. While exploring formats, Dudhat once added a picture frame around one of their jacket panels and posted it on Instagram. It caught the attention of architect Nishil Shah who used two of their artworks in his project, and the brand started gaining popularity. Morii now focuses on one-of-a-kind textile art pieces and wall art, with the most recent and the largest piece being 5 metres by 3 metres.

With a natural and earthy palette, Dudhat’s work is organic, abstract and intuitive, reminiscent of aerial views of landscapes, conceptually depicting themes like global warming and climate change. Through her artworks, Dudhat wants to generate awareness.

Today, reimagining traditional Indian crafts through contemporary textile art, Dudhat collaborates with over 165 women artisans from 12 villages across India, combining techniques such as Sujani embroidery from Bihar, Bela block printing, and Rabari embroidery with contemporary abstract designs from Kutch and Kantha embroidery from West Bengal. “We focus on sustainability, ensuring artisans can work in their villages while earning fair wages, maintaining traditions and fostering pride in their craft,” she says.

Before adopting a new cluster, Morii does a paid training workshop for the artisans to upskill them and bring back the fineness seen in 100-year-old antique embroidery pieces. “We are particular about maintaining the geographical identity of the craft,” says Dudhat. “That’s why we go all the way to the original places where the craft originated and work with the heritage artisans.”

Apart from their products being available at their studio in Gandhinagar, Morii has partnered with a few stores and galleries in India and abroad, including The House of Things, Udaipur; Pure Concept Home, Mumbai; Under the Mango Gallery, Berlin; Salon Design, New York; and Obakki, Canada. In 2024, Morii exhibited internationally, with a solo show in Berlin and another in Perth, where Morii was invited to do an installation.

“We are building a studio and a gallery space near GIFT City, Gandhinagar, to showcase our work and sometimes host events and curated shows to promote works of other artists/designers,” says Dudhat.

“Along the steep learning curve, Brinda has first and foremost mastered the ability to make friends with her teachers—the craftswomen—to engage and enrich both the maker and the designer,” says Sethi. “She has found a format that goes beyond wearable art with skills to balance motifs, textures and combinations of colours, while remaining deeply committed to her craft,” he adds.

Brinda Dudhat (29)

Co-founder, Morii Design

Design and Architecture