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Cara Delevinge
is a property
tycoon
Page 17
MONDAY, JUNE 15, 2020
Syazwani Hj Rosli
Curiosity has been one of the most
signi icant drivers in cultivating cul-
tures of creativity.
This is also the case for 27-year-
old Khairunnisa Kassim, the founder
of Khraftonite.
Khairunnisa is self-taught and
has been doing embroidery full-
time for two years. She is a gradu-
ate of Universiti Brunei Darussalam
(UBD) and is the eldest of six sib-
lings. Her embroidery work often
consists of lorals, negative space,
thread painting and portraits.
Recently, she began selling Em-
broidery Starter Kits where she de-
signed the patterns and included a
few tools for those who wanted to
try embroidery.
“I come from a family where
art plays the biggest in luence. My
father and my second sister are
An embroidery by Khairunnisa Kassim
Weaving magic
A local graduate has turned her passion for embroidery into a business.
local artists who have been in the
creative industry for many years.
Last year, my sister opened Pet-
als and Palettes Art Studio in Kota
Batu where I am currently based,”
she said.
Her passion in embroidery be-
gan in 2017 when she was scrolling
through her Instagram, hoping to
ind a new hobby. She eventually
found videos on embroidery which
sparked her curiosity.
“I wanted to try my hand at it
but I didn’t know how where to look
for the materials in Brunei.
“I purchased the material from
a Malaysian embroider when I
was in Kuala Lumpur for vaca-
tion and got them delivered to my
friend’s house”.
The irst few months, she tried
making lowers, tried different
stitches, played around with the
colourful threads, and also learnt
a few tricks from the Internet and
YouTube videos, together with her
mother. Through a year of trial and
error, she managed to perfect her
stitches and master her stitching
skills. Then in 2018, Khraftonite
was established.
“I founded Khraftonite when I
was working as a full-time personal
assistant. I could only do embroi-
dery at night.
“The word Khraft is a play on the
word ‘Craft’ but I changed the irst
two letters to ‘Kh’ as my name starts
with it, and also because the letters
are both the initials of my parents.
“My siblings talked me into tak-
ing orders from Instagram and they
helped by advertising it on their
social media.
“I sold the irst few pieces to
friends but it wasn’t until October
2019 when I started to take it seri-
ously,” she said.
In December 2019, she decided
to resign from her job to develop
her embroidery business.
She started working with her
sister at her Art Studio to help
her with marketing and work on
her embroidery.
Khairunnisa said one of the
most challenging parts of em-
broidery would be trying to stitch
as neatly as possible, following
the outlines.
Continue to Page 16
Khairunnisa Kassim, the founder of Khraftonite