What is “Strings”?

A form of embroidery used to make lines on fabric with a sewing machine. Guided manually via hands. Asymmetry and Texture are core features.

Assymetry and Texture:

Strings is rooted in asymmetry. Deliberate, raw, real randomness comes about when I guide 3m of fabric through my Industrial Juki with my hands.

Pattern matching a garment with manually embroidered lines that are never truly straight is not always possible or even wanted.

Origin:

It started with a design that involved asymmetry. “The Sparrow” was a digital sketch that I made back in late 2024 that involved asymmetrical lines as a background and foreground. When I embarked on the amateurish (with no condescending undertone) journey of turning that into an actual garment I came across Mr. Fareed or Fareed Bhai in a clothing bazaar in Karachi.

Fareed Bhai is an embroiderer. A manual pfaff embroidery machine is like a prosthesis to him. On showing him my design of asymmetrical lines, he simply told me he couldn’t do it. He could only work on a limited area of fabric held taught by a frame. What I wanted was to embroiderer the whole length of a fabric 1m x 3m. This was only possible with a sewing machine. But if I wanted to use a more visible thread I should use a cotton perle thread on the bobbin he said. (a bobbin provides the bottom thread in a sewing machine).

Current:

While “The Sparrow” never realized, I’ve incorporated the strings technique into something that is classic and wearable. The Strings Button-Up shirts are come in multple patterns.
I continue innovating the technique in my own limited world. Plaid x Strings is a complexity that involves multiple different lines coming together to make a pattern that we take for granted everyday.

It all starts with a blank piece of fabric. I mark the embroidery pattern, and then start embroidering. Line by line, usually taking multiple sessions that I spread across days depending on the garment.

Shozab Lilani

7th February 2026