Did you know that when you purchase one of the 100% mulberry silk luxurious pieces from Naytra Couture, you are supporting a good cause? In fact, you are supporting three great causes – each serving as one of the three pillars that drive us. Starting with empowering women in rural villages in India to responsible, environmentally friendly, and sustainable fashion and last but not least a portion of the proceeds from each piece sold goes towards eliminating curable blindness. In this article, we share with you more about each of these pillars that drive Naytra Couture.
Women Empowering Women
Naytra’s founder, Shagun, was introduced to Madhubani paintings at the National Institute of Fashion Technology (NIFT) in New Delhi, India. She took a course named “The Influence of Ancient Indian Art on Textiles, Garments, Culture and Fashion”. This folk art form has been practiced by women in the rural villages in the Mithila and Madhubani regions for the past 2500 years. These colorful and captivating pieces of art would adorn the villages during festivals and special occasions.
When Shagun decided to bring her vision and dream to life with Naytra Couture. She could not help remembering those big, bold, and beautiful eyes – the emphasis of Madhubani paintings – that captivated her so many years ago. Working on a mission of women empowering women, Shagun now works directly with these female artisans to produce artwork for Naytra Couture, avoiding the middleman and ensuring that the artists are paid a living wage.
Responsible and Sustainable Fashion
All the luxurious pieces in Naytra’s collection have been produced responsibly. From the initial process of transforming a 2D piece of art into a 3D design and keeping the authenticity of the original artwork is very important to Naytra’s mission. Naytra, only works with partners that are certified environmentally friendly – OKEO-TEX standard 100 certified. This simply means that the 100% pure mulberry silk material does not contain any potentially hazardous substances and has produced using sustainable, environmentally friendly methods.
In addition, Naytra Couture operates with an absolutely no plastic policy. Every piece is delivered in a specially designed cotton Naytra bag and the box and tags are made from recycled paper. Every part of Naytra packaging is made with recycled, sustainable materials.
Eliminating Curable Blindness
At Naytra our mantra is – “what starts with Naytra ends with giving Naytra!” “Naytra” means eyes in Hindi and Sanskrit. Did you know that approximately 300 million people today suffer from some sort of visual impairment? 35 million people are totally blind. However, 80% of blind people suffer from curable blindness. To this end, Naytra works with Seva Foundation, donating a part of our proceeds to work towards eliminating curable blindness.
To date, with your help, we have donated the gift of sight to 25 people and we are looking forward to helping many more during the course of Naytra’s journey. Please join us in our mission to make the world a more “seeable” place!
