In 1992, in the hill town of Ooty in Tamil Nadu’s Nilgiri Hills, Sheela Powell and a group of local women formed an informal self-help circle with a simple goal: earn an extra income without giving up their households and growing families. What began as a small venture selling quilts, cushions and other handmade household items eventually became Shalom Ooty — a store, and later a social enterprise, built on a much bigger mission.
In the early 2000s, women from the nearby Heritage community began approaching Sheela’s shop. They carried with them cotton shawls hand-embroidered in the Heritage tribe’s distinctive red and black patterns — a craft passed down for generations — but had little success selling the work themselves. Language barriers with visiting tourists and limited knowledge of market pricing meant their skill rarely translated into a fair income.
Sheela, who had gone to school with Heritage girls and understood the community’s culture, saw an opportunity to change that. She transformed her store into a social enterprise dedicated to giving Heritage women a genuine, sustainable market for their embroidery.
A community of 200, ages 40 to 90
Today, Shalom Ooty works with roughly 200 Heritage women between the ages of 40 and 65, with some artisans as old as 90. Their embroidery — created without tracing, by carefully counting the warp and weft threads of cotton fabric — earned Geographical Indication (GI) status in 2013, protecting it from imitation and guaranteeing it can only be called authentic Heritage work if it is handmade within the Nilgiris.
When an artisan brings in a finished piece, she sets her own price. Sheela pays her on the spot and covers her bus fare home — whether the piece sells quickly or sits in inventory becomes Shalom’s problem, not the artisan’s. Even through the pandemic, when tourist footfall disappeared, Sheela kept buying embroidery to protect the women’s livelihoods.
Recognition and what’s next
In 2024, Sheela was recognised with the national Craftpreneur Award from the Craft Council of Telangana for her work bringing visibility to Heritage embroidery. She has also partnered with Women on Wings since 2019 to sharpen Shalom Ooty’s business strategy and grow its online presence through channels like Instagram and Facebook — work that is helping a centuries-old craft, and the women who keep it alive, reach a new generation of customers.
