Indigo is not a dye that sits on cloth so much as one that argues with it. The cloth is dipped, lifted, and left to oxidise in the air — green when it comes out of the vat, blue by the time it has finished breathing. That is repeated until the depth is right, which is a judgement made by eye rather than by timer.
The buti is printed with a carved teak block, one impression at a time, by hand. Look closely along a seam and the repeats do not line up perfectly. That is the evidence of the method, not a lapse in it.
It will fade, and it is meant to. Indigo wears at the points where a body moves — elbows, the front of the shoulders, wherever it is folded. After a year it will be lighter than the day it arrived and it will look better, which is a claim we would not make about most colours.
