Kolam by Sudha Balaji

 An auspicious  Pooja room kolam and hence not drawn at the entrance.  As in the case of many posts I have shown  the white kolam only.  It is preferable to decorate with kavi ( ochre ) colour.  Kavi is usually used for auspicious occasions. This kolam can be drawn for our Wednesday kolangal or Saturday kolam as these two days are important for Lord Vishnu We can also draw for Vaikunta Ekadasi festival , Purattasi month ( the whole month is considered important for Lord Venkateswara ) I have also added Goddess Lakshmi's Feet for this rangoli.  In traditional rangoli we represent Her through Feet patterns. The main rangoli represents the Lord through shanka and chakra designs with the Namam pattern at the centre.🙏🙏 I receive few suggestions on social media - like lines should be drawn from top to bottom, patterns should be drawn clockwise and not counter clockwise Though I appreciate their views , I think that we must first encourage drawing kolam dai...

    Rangoli making / Rangoli drawing - double stroke kolam T he first image shows the first step of the rangoli.  I have used only parallel lines drawn simultaneously in this design. Draw four pairs of intersecting lines.   From the ends of each line connect the adjacent line to get the pattern seen above. A very basic design that can by itself used as a simple rangoli for our homes.  The next design has evolved from the previous one.   Draw a parallel line border matching the contours of the first design.  Connect the border and the floral design with as many straight lines as possible The third step of the rangoli is shown below.  Decorate the periphery of the rangoli with floral motifs that are formed using spiral and circular patterns.   Also fill the petals at the centre with simple oval designs.  This is a plain rangoli by itself and can be drawn at entrances.  The rangoli can be filled with colours.  Adding col...

 First image The rangoli  starts with a plus and expands with semi-circular patterns and petal like designs .  It has a simple two line border filed with blue rangoli powder on which red dots are added.  All the four edges have spiral patterns.   The rangoli is filled with different colours yellow, green and blue. The remaining space that is black can also be filled with some colour of our choice,  only thing it is to be done carefully.  The rangoli with colours filled is available in Dusshera rangoli Second image - This kolam / rangoli  also uses floral petals as motifs.  The basic kolam is drawn with spiral patterns as shown.  The outermost patterns are based on floral petals and are used to decorate the kolam.  Third image - In the rangoli  the central design is drawn by drawing intersecting lines and forming the parallelogram like patterns.  The edge of each one is expanded with floral designs with two petals...

Important Rangoli tip   Filling up rangoli with colours of our choice or suitable to the motifs or patterns used.  Filling rangoli with rangoli powder also comes with practice because care should be taken to ensure that the colour of  one pattern or design does not spill into the other.   However, if it happens, it can be corrected.  For example if we fill a rose with pink colour and we inadvertently spill green meant for the leaves, on the pink petals, that can be corrected by adding pink again over the spilt green colour. Drawing  neat and beautiful curved lines makes the rangoli very attractive though it is a very simple rangoli design.  Colourful curved lines parallel to the white design can be drawn to  get a colourful design. Or leave it plain and simple. These rangolis can be used as apartment kolams as they are called in Tamil Nadu.  Apartment kolam are small rangoli designs drawn at the entrance of apartments due to constra...

 The first image shows   basic and simple freehand  kolam from common star rangoli Tradition has it that the  star shaped design is drawn with two lines.  Petals are drawn along the edges of the star pattern.   The gaps between are filled with floral petals and the rangoli is filled  colours to get the design shown below.    A simple but attractive rangoli.  Can be drawn in double quick time. The lotus, is widely used in  freehand rangolis.  No wonder I have also used them in Rangoli-sans-dots at the centre of a rangoli or on the periphery.  The lotus has been a religious symbol in India and one  can  find them  in religious places like temples.    The lotus in particular has been associated with  many Gods and  Puranic tales. Some freehand designs have been added between the petals.   Complete the rangoli with bright  colours. The motifs chosen should match ...

The first rangoli is a unique one created by me.   Observe how simple it is to create birds in rangoli kolam art.  The birds resemble ducks , don't they. All intricate details that are required in drawing or painting or not required here.  A simple free hand design to represent a bird will suffice.  To further improve the rangoli the birds are shown carrying fruits.  Fill the rangoli with colours as shown in the image.  It will suffice if we draw colourful lines inside the rangoli design.  A floral design with birds is ready for use.  One of the easiest and best ways to make birds patterns ! It is not necessary to fill the entire rangoli with colours  in these types of rangoli.  That is the beauty of this traditional art form.  We can depict birds and flowers quite easily .  It is not necessary to draw them with  a piece of chalk and then drawn with rangoli powder.  We can represent Nature through simple images ...

The elephant kolam design is a popular kolam with dots found in public domain.  It is also a popular kolam in our family.  Just as we have "family song" in our movies, there are some rangolis with dots that have been  popular in our family for decades.   This is one of them.  Another using  birds  has been shown in an earlier kolam here in this blog .  More will follow in the future. The dot pattern for this rangoli is 21 to 1 (ner pulli).  First draw all the elephants one by one.  Then the central floral design is drawn and the remaining dots are filled with floral designs.   Finally the colours are filled and remaining gaps are filled with some colour, brown in this case.  Free hand decorations of the elephant are done to complete the kolam with 21 dots this can be classified as a big kolam with dots. There are many more kolam that need a dot pattern using 20 and 25 dots.  Since drawing them by the traditional ...