How 6 Yards Story turned heritage into a global design brand
The story of 6 Yards Story did not begin with a trend forecast or a business blueprint. It began with the rhythmic clatter of handlooms in Sirajganj, heard the moment one steps into the village.
For Lora Khan, owner of 6 Yards Story, that sound was familiar. "For us, that sound means we have reached home," she says. But when she brought her architecture classmates there during a wedding, she realised how differently others perceived it.
For all latest news, follow The Daily Star's Google News channel. "My friends were fascinated," she recalls. "They kept asking what that sound was, how weaving worked, where the sarees came from."
What felt ordinary to her carried novelty and value for them.
From village wedding to digital storefront
The turning point came unexpectedly. After the trip, friends who had not gone began asking her to bring sarees for them.
"I realised that if five or six people were asking, others might too," Khan says.
She spoke to her mother, who gave her Tk 30,000 as seed money. "She told me to return the capital after selling the sarees."
In late 2013, when online commerce was still uncertain, Khan opened a Facebook page. "A saree is six yards long," she explains. "That's how the name '6 Yards Story' came."
The page began with sarees, photographed casually, modelled by friends. But something else caught people's attention.
When jewellery took over the narrative
"I felt the sarees looked incomplete without jewellery," Khan says. She styled her friends using pieces from her personal collection. The response surprised her. While saree orders came in, most questions were about the jewellery.
Where did it come from? How much did it cost? Could people buy it?
"I've always been very picky," she admits. "I didn't like just any jewellery." Her habit of DIY making came from that dissatisfaction. "If I liked a keyring, I would take it apart and turn it into a necklace locket."
Her architecture education gave her the confidence to design.
"Design is design," she says simply.
She started with three or four earring designs. "I just made them and posted photos," she recalls. The response was immediate. Jewellery quickly became the core of Six Yards Story. Sarees still exist, but they are no longer the focus. "The pressure of the jewellery business is so high now that we do not even publicise sarees much," she says.
Designing for a global stage
That architectural thinking became widely visible when Khan designed the jewellery worn by Tangia Zaman Methila at Miss Universe 2025.
"Honestly, it was a huge deal for me," Khan says. "I knew it was for a big stage, so I worked very hard on it."
What surprised her was the response. Two years earlier, she had designed jewellery for Methila at Cannes. "This time, I didn't expect a blockbuster response," she says. When one of the breastplate-style pieces went viral, it exceeded all expectations. "Those pieces went viral in a way I never imagined."
A designer without compartments
Lora Khan does not separate jewellery from architecture, or décor from emotion. For her, design is one continuous language. 6 Yards Story is not just a brand built on products, but on perception. It asks how objects sit in space, how they touch the body, and how they shape feeling. That coherence, rather than category, is what defines her work.
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