Community drapes
The Brahmika drape
A nineteenth century Bengali drape, with blouse and pallu over the left shoulder, linked to Jnanadanandini Devi of the Tagore family.
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The Brahmika drape, also called the Brahmo style, comes from Bengal in the 1800s. It is linked with Jnanadanandini Devi of the Tagore family, who is said to have adopted a way of wearing the saree with a blouse and the pallu over the left shoulder, so that women could appear in public. The method looks very much like what is now the Nivi.
Wrapped step by step
Each drawing shows the cloth so far, with the newest step outlined in gold. The figure is a front view; the wearer's left is on your right.
Step 1 Wear a blouse and a petticoat first, as this drape depends on them. Step 2 Wrap the saree once round the waist. Step 3 Gather the front into pleats. Step 4 Tuck the pleats in at the navel. Step 5 Carry the pallu across the chest and over the left shoulder. Step 6 Pin it with a brooch at the shoulder. Finished The Brahmika drape, seen from the front.
Where it comes from
In the nineteenth century, Bengali women of upper class households often wore the saree without a blouse and stayed within the home. Jnanadanandini Devi, the wife of Satyendranath Tagore, is reported to have developed a more covered way of dress, drawing on what she saw in Bombay, where Parsi and Gujarati dress was common. Women of the Brahmo Samaj, a reformist group, took it up, and it spread among the Bengali middle class.
How it looks
The saree is worn over a petticoat with a blouse, a chemise or a similar upper garment. The cloth is pleated at the front and the pallu is taken over the left shoulder and often pinned with a brooch. This pattern is close to the Nivi, and some writers see it as one of the roads by which the Nivi became a national style.
Who wears it and when
Today the Brahmika style is mostly a matter of history and costume, referred to in discussions of Bengali dress and shown in period films and in Tagore family portraits. The saree it describes is worn today as the ordinary Bengali Nivi.
Sarees worn this way
Also part of it, and being written: Baluchari sari (A silk saree with narrative figures, popular in the same period.).
Sources and further reading
Original text and drawings by the EveryPallu desk, written with AI assistance and checked against the sources above. The drawings are simplified diagrams of the order of wrapping, not a lesson: how a drape is worn differs from family to family. If we have something wrong, tell us.
Photo credits on this page
The small pictures above come from Wikimedia Commons under free licences. Some are cropped to fit.
- Tant sari: Billjones94, CC BY-SA 4.0, source