RESEARCHER • DESIGNER • EDUCATOR
Designing the future by bridging ancient wisdom & contemporary systems.
Research and textile-led design and craft pedagogy, rooted in traditions of the Panjab, where philosophy comes first, and the form follows.
Sidhant Minocha सिद्धांत मिनोचा ਸਿੱਧਾਂਤ ਮਿਨੋਚਾ سدھانت منوچا
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01
The Premise
Research leads design परिचय ਪਛਾਣ تعارف
Most design runs form-first, with meaning added later as a story. Mine runs the other way.
I begin with the system a craft lives within - its grammar, its lineage, its materials, its economy - and let the form follow from what I find. The result carries meaning structurally, not just ornamentally. Research isn't a phase before the work; it is the work, continued in other ways.
INTO
Form
What gets made - motifs, objects, training programmes, writing - carries that thinking in its structure.
THROUGH
Framework
Three commitments shape every decision: swaraj, ecological balance, and decolonisation.
FROM
Research
I investigate the system a craft sits inside - its semiotics, lineage, materials, and economy.
02
Three commitments
The frameworks that lead the work मूल्य ਮੁੱਲ اقدار
Swaraj
स्वराज ਸਵਰਾਜ سوراج
Autonomy as a working principle - For artisans, for the practice itself, and for the systems we depend on. Self-rule over process, pricing, and narrative.
Ecological balance
संतुलन ਸੰਤੁਲਨ توازن
Systems remembering how to keep their own equilibrium. Material and partnership choices governed by lifecycle thinking, not aesthetic trends.
Decolonisation
स्वराज ਸਵਰਾਜ سوراج
Unlearning the inherited frame that treats craft as raw material for someone else's authorship. Vernacular knowledge as structure, not ornament.
You'll see these three named again across the work and the writing, tagged on each project, so the thinking stays visible in everything that gets made.
03
Selected work
Research, made visible कार्य ਕੰਮ کام
DECOLONISATION
SWARAJ
Project Phulkari
RESEARCH
What do the women of Phulkari mean by the motifs and patterns, besides the visual beauty, and the popular culture flattening them into an "ethnic motif"?
FRAMEWORK
Artisan ownership of narrative through their personal stories, translated by furthering motifs and patterns of Phulkari.
FORM
Design pedagogy and conduct a 20-day design skill development training programme for rural artisans, organised by the Delhi Crafts Council and sponsored by the BMW India Foundation. Outcome - Wall art (Launch due)
DECOLONISATION
SWARAJ
Dissertation Research at UCL
RESEARCH
What do diasporic Indian Panjabis consider "development" to be? Does it impact migrations or investment for the Indian Panjab?
FRAMEWORK
Amartya Sen's capability approach (1989), Ian Scoones's Sustainable Livelihoods Framework (SLF) (1998), Paul Robbins's Political Ecology (2004), and the reformulated SLF of Nithya Natarajan and colleagues (2022).
FORM
Ethnographic study of the Indian Panjabi diaspora and their spatiotemporally distributed households, with primary participants based in the chosen field site of Southall, London.
ECOLOGICAL BALANCE
Brand Sedhantik
RESEARCH
Semiotically strong block-printed products carrying meaning across its trade route.
FRAMEWORK
Low-impact material and process choices; sourcing aligned with bioregional health. Sartorial luxury consumer.
FORM
Collection of scarves and pocket squares with GOTS-certified organic and cruelty-free handloom silk and print dyes. Pieces sold mainly through multi-designer boutique stores in Germany and a few other countries, worn by PM Modi (2017,2021).
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ECOLOGICAL BALANCE
SWARAJ
Ikai Asai Collaboration
RESEARCH
Textile crafts of Kutch, Gujarat, to come together as table linen to complement terracotta, kansa, and long-pi pottery.
FRAMEWORK
Maximal on handmade craft and minimal on ornamentation and mechanised (electricity-requiring) processes, with indigenous skills and raw materials, to regard the ecology of the Kutch region
FORM
Handwoven, hand-sewn table covers, runners, mats and napkins. Seed to product made within Kutch. Incorporating indigenous rain-fed Kala cotton, handloom weaving, tangaliya dots, suf embroidery, extra weft, khilan hand joinery, and hand hemming.
15+
YEARS OF PRACTICE
200+
RURAL ARTISANS TRAINED
14+
VILLAGES WORKED WITH
5
COUNTRIES OF REACH
2×
WORN BY THE PM OF INDIA
Founder, Sedhantik ⋄ ex-Design Specialist, Formal Menswear, Wills Lifestyle (ITC Ltd.) ⋄ ex-Corporate Designer, Luxury Uniforms, Lecoanet Hemant
MSc Environmental Anthropology, UCL ⋄ Creative & Cultural Business Program, IIM-A ⋄ Young India Fellow, Ashoka University ⋄ B.A. Hons. Fashion Design, NTU
ALSO WORKED WITH
Delhi Crafts Council
Ashoka University
The Nabha Foundation
Cocccon Crafts & Loom
NIFT
Kheti Virasat Mission
Jyoti Fairworks
Pearl Academy
Balwaar Foundation
Ikai Asai
The Design Village
Khamir
WovenSouls
The Handloom School
Hast Kala Prints
Kala Raksha
Me&K Atelier
Kalhath Institute
Orient Craft
Parsons
Jos & Fine
DESIGNS CARRIED BY
Kamala (CCI) & dastkar
Liberty, London
Taj Khazana
German Boutiques
Alliance Française
Novica by Nat Geo
“…design as a means of conveying his concern for the environment, sustainability, natural materials, and a fair and equitable society - going beyond aesthetics, ornamentation and trends.”
Laila Tyabji
PADMA SHRI ◆ CO-FOUNDER & EX-CHAIRPERSON, DASTKAR
04
Work with me
Two ways in साथ ਨਾਲ ساتھ
TRACK 02
Design collaboration & creative direction
For premium brands and craft-led ventures: research-led design, creative direction, and an ecologically grounded sustainability narrative that operations can actually back up. Handicraft and premium product, spoken fluently.
TRACK 01