IVY LEAGUE
Hand-weaving madras in India
Madras is a handwoven cotton textile originating from the city of Madras on south east coast of India (now Chennai) that was popularized in America by Ralph Lauren and Brooks Brothers in the 1950’s as a preppy menswear staple.
In 20th century America madras was sometimes referred to as bleeding madras because the colors fade and run, on account of unstable organic dyes. Brooks Brothers turned this flaw into a marketing victory by promoting their ‘guaranteed to bleed’ shirts as a quality of inimitable Ivy League nonchalance, which is sadly ironic given the scandalous nature of the complete story of madras in America. In 1718 Yale University then named The Collegiate School approached the corrupt governor of Madras (Elihu Yale, a man with a reputation for abducting children to sell as slaves) with a request for funding. He made a substantial monetary donation along with books, a portrait of King George I and yardage of madras textiles. The school subsequently changed its name in his honor and a taste for the Indian handwoven textile in America was born.
Elihu Yale, William Cavendish the second Duke of Devonshire, Lord James Cavendish, Mr. Tunstal and an enslaved servant c 1708. Oil on canvas by an anonymous artist, property of The Yale Center for British Art
In southern Nigerian madras is known colloquially as george (or injiri) the name traces back to the trading post in Madras named Fort St. George from where the textile was exported to Africa by Portuguese, Dutch, then British traders. In India the textile was referred to as RMHK (which stands for “real Madras handkerchief”) to distinguish these Indian textiles made with ‘real’ plant-based dyes from similar Japanese textiles made with imitation dyes. The term handkerchief was adopted, notwithstanding the textiles being considerably larger than a handkerchief, to circumvent international trade regulations preventing textiles of certain dimensions from being exported.
George has been exported from India where it is still worn as a traditional men’s wrapper, or lungi, to the Calabar region of southern Nigeria since the 15th century and has been fully assimilated into Kalabari culture. It is worn by men and women, used for ceremonial purposes and for masquerade.
Madras is also used to make pelete bite; a textile unique to the Kalabri people whereby individual threads are first cut and then pulled out of the textile to create new geometric patterns within the original woven plaid pattern.
Pelete bite, property of the Minneapolis Institute of Art
Women attending a Kalabari funeral wearing pelete bite wrappers, george head ties and commemorative t-shirts bearing a portrait of the deceased
Daly, M. Catherine. “Iria Bo Appearance at Kalabari Funerals.” African Arts 21, no. 1 (1987): 58–86.
Eicher, Joanne Bubolz, and Tonye Erekosima. “Kalabari Funerals: Celebration and Display.” African Arts 21 (1987): 38–45.
Ivy Style: Radical Conformists. (New Haven; New York: Yale University Press ; Fashion Institute, 2012).