Cobalt Grid Shirt

The Cobalt Grid Shirt is a handwoven khadi check shirt in cornflower blue on undyed cream cotton. The check is a grid within a grid: bold blue lines making squares about 22 mm across, with a finer line of the same blue running exactly halfway between, quartering each square. Up close it reads like ruled graph paper.

Handspun, handwoven khadi

Every metre begins as yarn spun by hand and is woven on a handloom. The ground is unbleached cotton in its own pale oatmeal colour, carrying the slubs and occasional flecks a handloom leaves and a mill removes. Khadi is woven loosely enough to move air through it, which is why it stays cool in heat that defeats mill cotton, and it softens with every wash instead of wearing thin.

What makes this khadi check shirt different

Two line weights in one check means two different warp counts set up on the same loom, and the weaver has to keep the fine line centred between the bold ones across the whole length — drift of a few threads shows immediately as a crooked grid. Most checks use a single weight because it is far easier. The blue is a clear cornflower rather than a navy, so the cloth stays light, and the cream shows through every small square, which keeps it airy rather than heavy like a plaid. Six coconut-shell buttons run down a centre placket, each cut from a shell and no two the same shade of brown.

How it wears

A relaxed straight cut with a point collar, full sleeves and two-button barrel cuffs. There is no chest pocket, so the grid runs unbroken across the front. The hem is gently curved, so it sits properly untucked over trousers or jeans and tucks cleanly when you want it to. It goes with denim as easily as with chinos. For the same grid in a warmer colour see the Olive Grid Shirt, and the Green Check Khadi Shirt is a denser check in the same weight of cloth.

Why khadi

Khadi is spun and woven without electricity, by artisans paid for the hours the cloth actually takes. Buying a khadi check shirt keeps handloom households working and keeps alive a craft that industrial weaving came close to ending. The dye is drawn from plants rather than petrochemicals, so the cloth is gentle on skin and on the water it leaves behind.

Specification

Care

Hand wash separately in cold water for the first few washes, as natural dyes may bleed a little at first. Machine wash gentle thereafter. Do not bleach. Dry in shade; direct sun fades plant dyes. Warm iron. Expect the cloth to soften over the first season; that is the cloth behaving as it should.