Remembering Bim Bissell, ‘tireless promoter and patron’ of FabIndia

Few redefined traditional Indian textile aesthetics in the vocabulary of the modern quite like Bimla ‘Bim’ Bissell, the visionary revivalist and the driving force behind the crafts-rooted ‘everything Indian’ brand FabIndia.

On Friday (January 10, 2025), her friends, contemporaries and the brand she propelled to greater heights remembered the dynamic woman who was so much part of Delhi and its social fabric. Bissell died in New Delhi on Thursday (January 9, 2025). She was 93.

Fondly called Bim by everyone who knew her, she helped her husband and FabIndia founder John Bissell establish the brand in 1960 as a company exporting home furnishing.

Over the decades, FabIndia expanded to include garments, furniture, food, personal care products and even jewellery, becoming the go-to destination for many. Her sensibilities in fashion, textile and design flowed through the brand’s wide range of products.

“She loved matching everything, from her accessories to her chappals. A spirited promoter and patron of Fabindia ever since her husband, John, brought his vision of working with India’s craftspeople to life,” FabIndia wrote in a post on Instagram.

It was Bim who expanded John’s vision by collaborating with Indian artisans and craftspeople to make ethnic clothing steeped in modernity.

Jaya Jaitly, founder of Dastkari Haat Samiti, remembered her friend as the anchor and aesthetic that inspired John Bissell.

“Bim and I met before she married John Bissell. We had many family connections apart from anything to do with Fabindia and handlooms. But she was certainly the anchor and aesthetic that inspired John in his development of Fabindia. She was a gracious, gentle-spoken, helpful friend who invited my small kids to spend time at her nursery establishment called Playhouse School when we escaped to Delhi away from the freezing Srinagar winters,” Jaitly told PTI.

She added that her “extravagant way of wearing elaborate jewellery which, whatever her age, made her look beautiful”.

Bim’s career wasn’t limited to FabIndia. Before the textile brand, Bim worked as a social secretary to US ambassadors in Delhi and later worked with the World Bank as an external affairs officer from 1975 to 1996.

With the help of the Japanese government funds and the World Bank, Bim founded Udyogini, an NGO working for women’s economic empowerment, in 1992.

Congress leader Shashi Tharoor took to social media platform X to mourn the passing of the “doughty, tireless, colourful and sharp-witted Bim Bissell, who did more than anyone to make FabIndia one of India’s best-known brands”.

“More than 90% of my Kurtas come from her Emporia around the country. Her work also empowered craftsmen and made Indian handlooms chic. Though I had not seen her for some time (since I have largely been in Delhi only during Parliament sessions), I shall miss her commanding presence, especially at her lively Christmas parties,” Tharoor wrote.

Laila Tyabji, an important figure in reviving Indian traditional crafts, said in a Facebook post that Bim was synonymous with “an ebullient zest for life, hospitality, caring, intelligence, and friendship”.

Tyabji recalled meeting with Bim a few months for lunch where she “rolled up smiling in her wheelchair” and “put everybody to shame” with her elaborate and active day plans.

“After lunch, as the rest of us looked forward to our post-prandial Sunday naps, she brightly informed us she was off to a dentists appointment and later to a lecture at the IIC and then would squeeze in a friend’s book release before going on to a farewell dinner for a departing diplomat. All of us, well over a decade or two younger, were duly put to shame! So typical,” Tyabji shared about the “down to earth Punjaban, full of humour and realism”.

While author Mrinal Pande remembered Bim as “warm, gracious, artistic and an excellent teacher and mentor of the young”, journalist and TMC MP Sagarika Ghose said she was “universally loved”.

“‘Show up for your friends,’ she once told me, ‘because it is in giving that you receive.’ Will miss you every day my beloved Bim,” Ghose posted on X.

Sanjoy K Roy of Teamwork Arts, production company behind the Jaipur Literature Festival, said Bim’s “empathy, love for all things craft, and generosity of spirit will be her lasting legacy”.