Meet Swati

American-born Swati Argade is the Founder and Creative Director of Bhoomki, one of New York City’s leading destinations for sustainable fashion since 2012.

Swati began her fashion career in South India while working on a documentary. After meeting weavers in Andhra Pradesh who struggled to find markets for their cloth, Swati created a small collection showcasing their weaving skills. After numerous strangers stopped her on the streets of New York to enquire about her clothing, she decided to launch a womenswear line incorporating handmade sustainable fabrics with tailored silhouettes.

In 2006 while in Calcutta, Swati was shocked to see children on factory floors producing $5,000 leather bags—the kind found in glossy fashion magazines. She decided to take a break from producing fashion collections to study the apparel supply chain and identify solutions for change. In 2012 Swati opened Bhoomki Boutique to provide a space for customers to discover brands committed to social and environmental responsibility.

Swati has Bachelor’s degrees in Art History and Business Administration from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, and a Master’s degree in South Asian Studies with a concentration in film from the University of California, Berkeley. She has also studied garment construction at the Fashion Institute of Technology in New York City. Swati is a founding faculty member of the School of the New York Times where she is the lead fashion educator. In 2017, she was chosen as one of four women entrepreneurs by technology giant Intel in their campaign #SheOwnsIt. Her work has been featured in such publications as Elle, Lucky, Wall Street Journal, The Huffington Post, Associated Press, Brooklyn Magazine and The Nation.