“The concept of working with nature, extracting colour from plants, leaves, flowers, and being inspired by it was truly fascinating. You can’t control nature and that’s the beauty of natural dyes.”

~ Janhavi

Akané, pronounced as Ah-Kah-Nay, is the Japanese word for madder root or Manjishtha which has been used as a natural dye material traditionally to derive a deep red colour since ancient times.  

The studio was a result of Janhavi’s graduation project, directed at the fast fashion industry's realities and inspired by “The True Cost” documentary. Moved by the concept of mass consumerism, capitalism, and unhealthy purchasing habits and through years of learning and experimenting, Janhavi and Juhi’s project developed into their slow fashion brand, Akané.

Akané creates naturally dyed, versatile and timeless products. They respect the process of making a product by involving local artisans, sourcing locally and ensuring zero waste. The sistes make use of natural dye materials that are easily available in the environment such as flowers, seeds, roots and leaves. Akané believes in creating value rather than just a need for consumption through our products. It's their vision to spread awareness about slow fashion and inspire people to make the right decision by providing sustainable alternatives for customers. 

Akané dyes are natural dyes. Most are of plant origin and extracted from roots, wood, bark, berries, leaves, flowers, nuts, and seeds. Natural dyeing has been around for a really long time than most of us would assume. The history of dyeing in India seems to have started in the pre-Vedic period proved by a piece of purple cotton found in Mohenjodaro in 3000 B.C. which seemed to have been dyed with madder. Natural dyeing was a tradition that was commonplace in the country until 40 years ago, when synthetic dyes took off.