Soul & Thread. The founder's column, written by Deesha Goswami.
People ask why the label is called House of Falguni and not House of Deesha. I didn't want it to be about me. I wanted it to carry the name of the woman who taught me how to look at things.
Falguni is my mother. Long before I knew what a warp or a weft was, she showed me that beauty lives in small, deliberate things: a seam finished well, a gift wrapped like it mattered. She used to say that beauty lies in the little things we create with love and intention. I only understood the weight of that line once I started making clothes myself.
I remember standing with her at an open cupboard while she pulled out one piece after another, telling me not just what to wear but why. A family function needed fabric with weight and structure, something that held its shape through a long evening. An ordinary catch-up with friends over chai needed the opposite: soft, easy cloth you stop thinking about the moment it's on. She taught me that the occasion and the material had to agree with each other. I was learning textiles long before I knew that was the word for it.
My own road here was not a straight one. I began with a Diploma in Textile Manufacturing at R.C. Technical Institute, then completed a bachelor’s in Textile Engineering at L.D. College of Engineering. I spent years understanding fabric at the level of fibre and yarn: not just how it looks but how it behaves, why it drapes the way it does, what makes one weave last while another falls apart. I worked in places most people never connect with fashion, including research labs where the same engineering that makes a garment hold its shape gets used in far harder conditions. Later, I completed a Master’s in Fashion Management at NIFT Gandhinagar, because I wanted to turn that knowledge into something a woman could wear to work on a Tuesday.
That mix is why House of Falguni is what it is. I know fabric from the inside, so I won't put my mother's name on something that doesn't earn it. And I know my customer, because I am her. She does it all and still wants to feel like herself while she does it. She shouldn't have to choose between looking polished and feeling at home in her clothes. I never wanted to.
So we make everything by hand, in Ahmedabad, starting from homegrown cotton and designed to sit between Indian and modern without committing to either. Indo-western workwear that carries a little heritage with it, cut to be worn on a regular Tuesday rather than saved for occasions. That choice comes from my mother's belief that the everyday deserves care too.
This column is where I write in my own voice. You'll get how I think about what we make and why we make it this way, the people behind it, and the ideas I'm still working out. Some entries will be about craft. Others about building this from nothing. Today's is about where it began.
It began with her. The house carries her name, and everything in it is made to carry stories.
With love, Deesha
The first fabric I ever really looked at
I was maybe eleven, sitting on the floor of my mother's room while she sorted through a trunk of old sarees, and she handed me a piece of ikat and asked me to guess how the pattern got there. I said it was printed. She laughed and told me to look closer, at how the colour lived inside the thread itself, not on top of it. That was the first time I understood that cloth had a process behind it, a decision made before a single thread touched the loom. I did not know yet that I would spend my career chasing that same question in fabric after fabric.
What building something from nothing actually looks like
Nobody tells you how much of starting a house like this is unglamorous. It was fabric samples spread across my dining table at midnight, phone calls to artisans in Kutch who were patient with someone still learning their craft, and a spreadsheet of margins that made no sense for the first year. I do not say this for sympathy. I say it because I think women considering something similar deserve the honest version, not the polished one that shows up after the fact.
Why the everyday matters more than the occasion
Most Indian fashion, historically, has been built around the big day: the wedding, the festival, the once-a-year saree. I wanted House of Falguni to matter on a Tuesday. My mother never treated an ordinary afternoon as less worthy of care than a wedding, and that instinct is the actual foundation of this brand, more than any single design choice. A woman should not need an occasion to feel like herself in what she is wearing.
A note on doing this slowly
I get asked often why we do not scale faster, launch more collections, chase more volume. The honest answer is that speed and the kind of care my mother taught me do not coexist easily. I would rather grow at the pace our artisans can actually sustain than grow past the point where I still recognise the quality of what we are making. That is a business decision as much as a personal one, and I stand behind it fully.
What I hope this house becomes
I hope, years from now, a woman somewhere reaches for a House of Falguni piece the way I once reached for something of my mother's, without thinking about it, because it was simply there and it simply worked. That is not a grand ambition. It is a quiet one, the same size as the lesson that started all of this.
On the artisans who taught me as much as I taught them
I came into this with a formal education in textiles, but the artisans I have worked with in and around Ahmedabad taught me things no classroom could. A block-printer showing me, without a word wasted, exactly how much pressure a hand-carved block needs before it transfers colour cleanly. A bangle-maker explaining why a certain metal sings differently than another. I do not think of these as suppliers. I think of them as the people who actually make House of Falguni what it is, and I try never to forget that in how we work together.
A small honesty about the harder days
Not every week of building this has felt like purpose and craft. Some weeks it has felt like spreadsheets, missed deadlines and the particular exhaustion of trying to hold quality and growth in the same hand. I write this column, in part, because I think the polished version of a founder's story does a disservice to anyone else considering the same path. The hard days are real. So is the reason I keep showing up for the next one.
Why I still choose Ahmedabad
I could have built this brand anywhere, sourced from anywhere, manufactured wherever it was cheapest. I chose to stay rooted here, in the city where my mother raised me and where the artisans I work with have spent generations perfecting their craft. There is a cost to that choice, in convenience and sometimes in margin. There is also a value in it that no spreadsheet fully captures: the ability to walk into a workshop, see a piece being made with my own eyes, and know exactly whose hands shaped it.
A question I ask myself often
Before we release anything new, I ask myself whether my mother would recognise the care in it. Not whether it would sell, not whether it follows a trend, but whether the attention to detail matches the standard she quietly held for everything she made and gave. It is not a perfect measure. It has kept us honest more times than I can count.
Frequently asked questions
Why is the brand called House of Falguni and not House of Deesha?
Because the founder didn't want it to be about her. She wanted it to carry the name of the woman who taught her to see beauty in small, deliberate things: her mother, Falguni.
What is Deesha Goswami's background before founding House of Falguni?
A Diploma in Textile Manufacturing at R.C. Technical Institute, a bachelor's in Textile Engineering at L.D. College of Engineering, and a Master's in Fashion Management at NIFT Gandhinagar, alongside years spent understanding fabric at the level of fibre and yarn.
What lesson from her mother shaped how Deesha designs?
That the occasion and the material have to agree with each other: a family function needs fabric with weight and structure, while an easy afternoon needs soft cloth you stop noticing the moment it's on.
What is Soul & Thread?
The founder's own column, where Deesha writes in her own voice about craft, the people behind House of Falguni, and the ideas she's still working through.
I read every note. If something here resonated, reach me on LinkedIn or through our Contact page.
House of Falguni is a handcrafted Indo-western label based in Ahmedabad, made for the woman who does it all.