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| Does the shine still seem as attractive?… |
…now that you know how these beautiful moths are killed for the sake of your vanity? |
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| Types of silk |
| There are 4 varieties of silk obtained from four types of moths in India – Mulberry, Tussar, Eri, Muga. Once woven, silk is known by different names depending on the weave, style, design and place where it is woven. |
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| 100% silk materials : |
| Boski, Pure Crepe, Pure Chiffon, Pure Gaji, Pure Georgette, Khadi Silk, Organza, Pure Satin, Raw Silk, and Matka Silk. |
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| 100% silk sarees : |
| Banarasi, Bangalore, Bhagalpore, Dhakai, Dharmavaram, Kashmiri, Khambat, Kanjivaram, Murshidabad, Patola, Tanchoi, Tussar, Temple, Paithani. |
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| Co-products of silk |
| Sericin or Silk protein : The ‘gum’ that holds the twin silk filaments together. Used in cosmetics as the main ingredient in shampoos and creams. |
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| Silk Oil : Made from boiling live cocoons of silk worms, silk oil is used in the cosmetic industry for making beauty soaps and moisturisers. |
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| Silk Powder : Silk powder which is obtained from the secretion of a silk worm, goes into the making of face powders, eye shadow. |
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| Look for silk (and co-products of silk) also in: |
| Any attire (eg, head ribbons)
lampshades
carpets
wall-hangings
typewriter and printer ribbons
surgical sutures
screen-printing screens
soft furnishing (curtains, bed sheets)
toiletteries (eg, shampoo, body lotions) |
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| How do I tell if a cloth is made of silk? |
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Take a few threads from the warp and the weft and burn them from their ends. When the thread stops burning, a very tiny (pinhead size) ash ball might be left behind. Rub it between your fingers and smell the powdered ash. |
| If silk, it should smell like burnt hair. Silk, wool, leather and hair all burn alike and form an ash ball. |
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| If the fibre is a petroleum product like polyester or nylon, it would burn forming a tiny, hard, glass-like bead. |
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- If cotton or rayon, the fibres will quickly flare up and not form any ash ball nor smell like burnt hair.
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| Alternatives |
| More- and less-harming silks |
- Spun Silk: Also popularizes as ‘Ahimsak Silk’, this silk is made by letting the newborn moths emerge from the coccon and fly away instead of boiling them alive. However, cocoons sourced for this process are again obtained from silk farms. This means that though new born moths escape the boiling pot, nothing changes for the female moth back at the silk farm who continues to be crushed to death. This silk is not as lusturous and smooth as ‘reeled silk’ – that is formed by reeling the entire unbroken filament – but is often more fluffy and soft. It is therefore not usually suited for making saris but is used instead for shirting, ties, and furnishings.
- Wild Silk: This is a variety of silk that is obtained from silk worms that are not bred on mulberry trees but whose cocoons are collected from the forests. Tassar silk is again a variety of wild silk. The catepillars producing tassar silk have never been successfully cultivated and cultured in captivity. These coccons are gathered from the rainforests.
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| Non-animal alternatives to silk |
| Art Silk (artificial silk). The most well known of these is Rayon (viscose) which is of vegetable origin; while Nylon and Polyester (terrene) are petroleum products. |
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| Did you know?… |
| Zari contains silk! Zari is not a straight length of metallic wire—it is wire (gold or silver) wound around a thread. The thread is often made of silk. |
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| Killing female moths : Our most recent research in Hyderabad reveals that the method of killing female moths has changed nowadays from crushing them in mortar-and-pestle to chopping and mincing them alive in a mixer-blender ! |
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| Khadi Silk: Ahimsa in the Warp…Himsa in the Weft |
| In one direction runs the thread that reminds us of the father of our nation who revived the use of the material from almost its deathbed to win us our freedom. In the other direction runs the thread that comes from killing thousands of living creatures for vanity, thus violating the spirit of non-violence so dear to him. So is the resulting cloth ethical to wear or not? BWC’s answer is unequivocal: no material which has caused needless pain to any creature is ethical to use. Mixing silk threads with khadi is to adulterate the latter, to spoil the purity of khadi for the temptation of more money. |
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