All kolams serve embellish the doorstep and make it look more beautiful. The dry, coarsely ground rice flour is placed between the thumb and the forefinger and rubbed together and moved along a predetermined design by the drawer. This is an art taught at a young age and is difficult to master unless you practice. Elaborate designs are made on all occasions. Decorating the floor in different parts of the house is believed to be a good sign.
Rice powder is readily available at home.
It serves to feed ants to show one must take care of other forms of life. The entrance decoration is a gesture of welcome. It is a symbol of inviting goddess Mahalakshmy to home everyday. The designs are symbolic and basically common to the whole country, like geometrical patterns with line, dots, squares, circles triangles, the swastica, lotus, trident conch shell, leaves, trees and flowers. No gaps to be left anywhere between the line for evil spirits to enter.