Tamil Nadu and South India
Kolam & Rangoli
Dot grids and single unbroken lines, drawn on doorsteps before sunrise.
- Motifspulli dot grid · sikku interlace · lotus · conch · padi kolam
- Line weightintermediate
- Available onprints · apparel · home · tech · books · digital
The story
Where Kolam & Rangoli comes from
A kolam begins with dots. The person drawing it sets out a grid of pulli — usually an odd number per row — and then draws one continuous line that loops around every dot without ever crossing a dot or lifting from the ground. That constraint is the whole art form. It is why a kolam looks woven even though nothing is woven, and why two kolams on the same grid can be completely different drawings. Traditionally they are made at dawn in rice flour, on the swept threshold of a house, and they are gone by evening — walked on, rained on, eaten by ants. Our family keeps the grid visible in most designs, because the dots are the instruction: they tell you where the line has to go, and they are the reason a beginner can draw one.
Samples
Four from this family
Everything it is on
6 products
Want this design on something we do not make yet?
Tell us the product and we will say honestly whether our partners can print it and whether the drawing survives at that size. Some of our families do not work on small items, and we would rather say so than sell you a blur.