FYI: We've heard of ayurvedic massage, but ayurvedic clothing? How does that work?

Ayurvedic massage - a speciality of India's Kerala state - is familiar to all spa-goers. The body, dripping with hot herbal oils, is kneaded like dough until the toxins and tensions of modern life have been pummelled out of it.

Less well known is a new product from the southern state: ayurvedic cloth, which is a cotton fabric infused with the same herbal oils. It sounds like an unusual remedy but if these oils can relieve skin ailments, aching joints and hypertension, then it follows that the same herbs, applied to fabric, should have a similar effect when it is worn.

Ayurveda is a 5,000-year-old system of medicine used by millions in India. It has also had widespread influence on Chinese and Tibetan medicine.

Ayurvedic massages are so popular with foreigners that virtually every luxury hotel boasts an ayurvedic spa. Now, Kerala's weavers are hoping a medicinally treated 'wonder fabric', called ayurvastra, becomes as fashionable at home and abroad.

Ayur is Sanskrit for 'health' while vastra means 'cloth', so ayurvastra literally translates as 'health cloth'. The material is used for making clothes, bedding and curtains.

The Handloom Weavers Development Society co-operative grows organic cotton in the tiny palm-fringed village of Balaramapuram. The yarn is woven using a special gum and dyed with extracts from natural plants such as sandalwood, pomegranate, indigo, turmeric and aloe vera.

After the yarn has been woven, it is soaked with herbs before being put out to dry - not just in any old backyard but in a special herb garden, where it absorbs yet more of the plants' healing properties.