a tatreez story

There are a lot of parts to this story: the textile, how I found it, what it’s own (partially known) story is, what I decided to do with it, and the work and result of that. This may be a long post, but I think that’s better than dividing it up into episodes. I also hope the story continues, and will happily add updates when there’s more.

Tatreez piece, rolled up and prominent in my studio. For more information on tatreez: Tatreez and Tea, Tatreez Traditions, Tiraz Home for Arab Dress are all excellent resources.

Having found this piece in January, 2023, I will have lived with it for almost exactly one year. The uniqueness of a handmade piece makes it like a person’s face, something you learn to recognize beyond doubt. So the presence of it becomes familiar. I kept this piece visible in my studio for many months before I knew what I would do with it, and its face is precious to me. Even now, I sit and stare at the photos, enthralled, and have to urge myself to work with words… in some ways, the textile says everything on its own.

At the time of finding it, the attack on Gaza had been under way for (only) 3 months, and the sight of Palestinian embroidery pierced my heart. Somehow I felt that it was older, made as part of an original garment, but I didn’t really know anything for sure except “Palestinian cross stitch.” It was in a consignment shop in Port Townsend, Washington, where many of us buy and sell each other’s goods. It had been sewn by machine into a sturdy linen border & backing, which I left on while I contemplated what to do with this piece, apart from posting photos online over and over again.

When I finally removed the border linen and held the tatreez piece by itself for the first time, the voice of it came to life. Handling an old textile, there is a liveliness, a warmth to it, like holding someone’s hand. Being able to touch both sides and to see the back was like a direct communication with the maker, the woman who held it before - a more intimate listening to the language she wrote with her stitched marks.

Then I learned more about this piece. I noted that the three uniform-sized panels are not the style of design used for a Palestinian dress. Reading further into Shelagh Weir’s Palestinian Costume book, I saw that the Hebron area head shawls, or ghudfeh, have three panels, and bands of embroidery along one end. Using ghudfeh as a search term, I found other examples, also identified as Hebron works. Clicking through links, I suddenly found myself looking at exactly the same embroidery patterns, in a portion of a shawl in the collection of the Textile Research Centre of Leiden, Netherlands.

Doing a watercolor painting of a textile is a great way to study the designs, complexity, scale, and color choices, to learn more about the language.

The same! I knew the designs well, having looked closely enough to try to paint them. I still don’t know what this similarity means, exactly - what is the microcosm of shared embroidery vocabulary that would result in such an identical design… same family, or village, or time frame within an area? I haven’t successfully communicated with any textile scholars about this yet, but it’s certainly striking - I’ve looked at a lot of tatreez, and this is the only time I’m aware of seeing identical patterning. The benefit is that I can more confidently place the segment I have in time and place. And the conclusion of the TRC folks, in consultation with Wafa Gnaim, is that their piece is c.1900.

When we talk about old textiles, I know there’s a tendency to glorify age for its own sake - older pieces are more valuable, considered more authentic. Sometimes this is unfair to anyone still making textiles now, and in terms of the marketplace, I believe in supporting active craftspeople and not inflating value based on scarcity or exclusivity of access. (I’m also opposed to the way the textile collecting world mirrors the rest of the fine art luxury market in this way, with artificial fashion trends and status competition affecting the way things are valued. The inherent value of textiles and why they matter has nothing to do with all of that.) When I revere something older, it’s because of the life that is in it, the context that was woven or stitched into the piece itself, through materials and technique and the lived experience of the maker.

In this case, finding out how old this piece is likely to be was emotionally moving, because it places the original maker before so much of the suffering and disruption that her people are experiencing now. These stitches were made before Israel was established as a country, before anyone in this woman’s home environment was being forced to fight for their ability to live there, or flee. Her voice is grounded in place, and the language of her composition flows like confident music. Knowing that this piece was made in the pride and faith of belonging, of fully living her culture, makes it a powerful message from an ancestor, something to pass on strength and integrity of being.

Magnified view of the cross stitch embroidery - the white lines on the side are millimeters.

Which leads me to the obvious need to put it into Palestinian hands. I’d been contemplating this, how to give this on to someone for whom it would have personal, identifying meaning. And after meeting and beginning a correspondence with the musician Abdul-Wahab Kayyali, (whom I have mentioned before) the thought occurred to me: could it be made into a gift for either display in the home, or to wear? I had not yet come up with anything when he happened to mention in an email that he was interested in wearing tatreez while performing. This gave me a concrete goal, and I started thinking about a wearable base that could serve as support for this textile.

Abdul-Wahab Kayyali plays with guitarist Tariq Harb as the duo 17 Strings.

I envisioned a boxy jacket that could go over a dress shirt, with the tatreez wrapping around the jacket body, above the hem. I think I was influenced by Southeast Asian tribal clothing shapes in going for a black, square jacket - but I also found these Turkish fellows looking very sharp, which I was sure the recipient would appreciate, given his musical and personal Turkish connections. The Turkish image gave me the idea to use piping along the neck and front opening. I got some black linen twill from my local fabric shop, and found a suitable silk for piping in my stash of fabrics I’ve dyed in the past. After a few practice runs with making and sewing piping, I took the plunge and cut the linen, creating a piped edge along the round neck and center front, between two layers of linen.

Piping is basted onto one side in the first step

Linen is shifty stuff, so there was much basting. The two layers of the jacket body were basted before cutting the neck, and here I’m basting them again after sewing the piping in the neck edge, before adding sleeves.

I decided on a T pattern with square gussets for the sleeves.

(I’m narrating it slightly out of order. I was already well into the project when I found out the age of the piece. This caused me to [hyperventilate and buzz around going omg and then] be more thorough in my documentation of the textile, especially the back which would no longer be accessible once it was mounted on the jacket. I will make the images and information available to others who work with preserving Palestinian textiles, if they are interested.)

Magnified view of stitches including joining stitch. Millimeters marked at the side.

The back side of the embroidery

Given that the sleeves would be visible, I wanted to add something decorative on the cuffs. In dresses from the 1930’s or earlier, Palestinian women used imported silk taffeta to appliqué onto the skirt panels. A typical design is a rectangular strip with diagonal lines made by reverse appliqué. A slit is cut into the silk, and the edges are turned under and stitched. I knew this technique from other textile cultures, and had done it myself in the past. I auditioned a few different silks and practiced the reverse appliqué several times over, before working it onto the jacket sleeves. The cuffs have a small vent, and are hemmed with lines of running stitch in handspun yak/silk yarn. Running stitch is another embellishment that is seen in Palestinian garments and cloth. 

Some of my reverse appliqué samples, with the preferred choice in the foreground.

Image from Shelagh Weir’s Palestinian Costume book showing a dress with taffeta appliqué in the center front of the skirt.

Spindle-spun yak/silk singles, sewn in rows of running stitch along the cuff hem.

The idea was to provide a supportive, wearable base for the tatreez, consistent with some aspects of Palestinian textile culture, while not drawing attention away from the embroidery. It is different enough from any traditional garment that, I hope, it takes the tatreez sufficiently out of context to be essentially honored as an element of traditional culture, and not co-opted in a way that conflicts with its original use. 

Primarily, it is a way to connect the voice and art of an ancestor with the living continuation of her culture, to make it possible for others to continue listening to and learning from the beauty and message and strength of this textile.  I hope that it will provide deep-rooted support for this musician as he expands his creative and expressive potential through composition and performance. Like the tatreez piece, his music is powerful, compelling, and tapped into strong cultural roots. 

Abdul-Wahab Kayyali during a performance of Mafaza, in a screenshot from the Instagram of Majd Sukar, co-composer of the Henna Platform production. Photo by Joshua Best.

The image above was concurrent with my beginning work on this jacket, and I hope I can convey how much it broke my heart. Mafaza is a powerful stage production, involving two Syrian poets, Waeel Saad al-Din and Mosab Alnomire, and two musicians, Abdul-Wahab Kayyali and Syrian clarinet player Majd Sukar. The debut performances were in early November, 2024 in Toronto. I was compelled by the trailers and interviews that Henna Platform was sharing as the performance date approached, and I knew from Abdul-Wahab that creating this work was a strong experience for all of them. What I didn’t know until I saw this image was that the musicians, who were on stage the whole time along with the poets, were dressed and made up as survivors of an explosion, with torn and dirty jackets and dirt-smeared faces. The fact that they performed the whole time in the garb of the bombed, embodying the dehumanizing, targeted status that many would give them, was almost too much to fathom. And the contrast between this and the type of jacket I’m trying to make, the message I’m conveying with it, that this musician is esteemed and worthy of the best, most meticulous efforts - it still squeezes my heart when I think about it.

When I describe the details of the textile and the garment making, I’m trying to be thorough with the information, so I get into report-writing mode. But the feelings are there in the work and care, and the truth is I often had difficulty working on this project and not crying. It feels like the most important thing I’ve done in recent months, and one of the most significant textile projects I’ve ever had the honor to work on.

Beginning to stitch the sleeve detail, while listening to Les Arrivants.

Sewing the hem on Dec 7, 2024, the night that Syria was being liberated.

After the sleeves, and after sewing the hem, the only thing that remained was to attach the textile. I had one of those sudden bright ideas that come while lying in bed, regarding the stitching for securing the textile. Given that the jacket has two layers, if I quilted them together with colorful sashiko-type stitching, I could conceivably stitch the tatreez onto the top layer only, and then the stitches wouldn’t show on the inside of the garment. I basted guidelines for the top and bottom edge of the tatreez placement, and did some decorative stitching in between with (cotton) embroidery floss. (see finished photos)

The tatreez textile is tacked to the jacket body, which is wrapped around a large pillow.

Securing the textile along the top. The tricky part was sewing through the top layer only. The curved needles helped.

For mounting the textile, I needed a support that would hold the body of the jacket in a rounded way. I used a large throw pillow, covered with cotton cloth, and laid the jacket onto the textile, then wrapped it around to the front. After securing in several places with stitching rather than pins, I began to sew along the top edge, with white linen that was darkened with natural dye to match the old linen cloth. This was a chance to bring out the textile conservation needles - tiny little curved needles that are nearly impossible to thread and hold, but that make minimal holes in the textile. After a few minutes, I got back into the habit of holding the wee needle, and this part of the work was calm, reverent, and rewarding. Every moment of looking closely at this piece has been a gift.

Finishing the stitching on winter solstice, with the setting sun lighting up the tatreez textures.

Detail of finished jacket: bound side seam in foreground, interior decorative quilting stitches, and the outside of the jacket in the background, showing piping and textile.

When I finally hung and stepped back from the finished jacket, I was overwhelmed by a mix of emotions and anticipation, barely able to wait for my visit to Montreal and the giving of it.

As it happened, I was visiting Abdul-Wahab Kayyali on the 19th of January, 2025 - the day the ceasefire went into effect in Gaza, so the wild mix of emotions continued, and how could it not? The heaviness of all the surrounding story, of historical and present-day suffering, are bound up in this textile, this garment, and the friendship that has caused me to make it. Even where there is joy, and beauty, and love, deep pain is an inherent texture of it all. It brings Rilke’s phrase from a letter to mind: “Wie sollen wir es nicht schwer haben?” How can it not be heavy for us?

Nevertheless, it makes me very happy to report that the fit is just right, it works well with playing the oud, and when he first put it on he said, “Perfect.”

I’m quite sure there will be more photos of this project, here and there, and I look forward to sharing its public debut when Abdul-Wahab Kayyali chooses to wear it for a performance with Les Arrivants.

winter plans

I’ve got big plans for the next couple of months. They do not involve any travel, but possibly lots of walking. They are not about getting out, but going in. Digging around in my house and studio and digging on what I find there. Given that I’ll have a decent amount of time at home (if all goes as planned,) I hope to share some of what I do and find. Like this little piece, for example, about which more detail in the Akha page (under the textiles tab - I know, lots of pages, that’s how it is around here. Kind of like my studio space.)

Akha pouch with seed beads and metal discs, mounted on stretched linen, hanging in my studio. Purchased in Chiang Mai, Thialiand, 1998

I’m in my burrow and growing my peace and skills, with the help of fiber and textiles and the many people around the world who have given of their skills, over time, to enrich us all.

Action in the studio ranges from the always-in-progress weaving, to hand stitching, to machine piecing a quilt, to reading and writing and collage and sometimes all of them together. I’ve been modifying an 1895 tome on women’s health as a form of ….. resistance, or therapy, or radical optimism? Somehow it feels right to mark out all but the most positive, affirming words in this book of pompous misogyny masquerading as scientific knowledge. And often, the happy words are very few.

Book page, collaged and marked, with the words “support future friends now” remaining visible.

Book page, collaged and marked, with “CHILD - life - life” remaining.

But that’s an occasional exercise - as with many situations, I find it more fulfilling to engage and uplift the things that move me rather than to try to block out all the enervating, maddeningly entrenched negativity and ignorance. So many excellent people are moving along with their important, responsible, loving and living work. Voices I value right now are Alexis Pauline Gumbs, Tricia Hersey, and Reverend angel Kyodo williams, as well as my forever homey R.M. Rilke, whose Book of Hours I’m moving through very slowly in German, dictionary in my lap and helpful translations nearby.

finishing, and other distractions

This tiny snail was on the stem of my CSA broccoli, and I remembered I have a camera with a good macro setting. So I was diverted by looking at the snail and taking lots of photos as it scooted around on the stem. I called this one Snail Side-eye. That shell! The delicacy was entrancing. The shell is only about 1/4” wide, maybe 5mm.

You know that thing I said last time about how once I’ve finished something, it already seems old? That may be one reason why it’s hard for me to get around to sharing Finished Object photos. The other is the distraction factor, because the thoughts and images that elbow their way to the front of the queue are never exactly what I thought I might intend to talk about. Witness, the tiny snail.
But anyway, this weaving is finished, except for the fringe/edge treatment. I’m still undecided on what I’m doing at each end, but here’s three panels, joined with figure 8 stitch. It has been incorporated into the textile array in the low seating area that we call the majlis, our couch, where I am currently ensconced among weavings and pillows.

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Bedouin style weaving, from handspun Navajo churro wool, 3 panels stitched together.

Now, I meant to include this next item with the petticoat details in the last post, because they are related. The Sarah-dippity skirt is, at long last, finished. The picture below is from nearly a year ago (this has been a long-running project). I tried it on when I had finished knitting the panels and put buttonholes in the last panel, whose shaping was made with short rows - and yeah, I could use some short row shaping finesse, but I decided what’s a little hem wonk among friends?

Backing up as I realize I may never have shared the in-progress bits, possibly because I was waiting until it was finished…..? Sigh. However, this is backstrap-woven fabric, begun in October 2019, 100% Harrisville Shetland wool yarn in a random stripey warp that was a bit of a circus act to wind, but satisfying to weave. I knit the intervening panels with the same yarn, using up the dark brown cone. I was sewing the panels together in February 2020, prior to knitting the final front piece. My waist-to-hip ratio required some more radical deductions in fitting the wedges to the straight pieces, which added to the delay in getting through that phase.

Shetland wool stripes in progress on backstrap loom, leather backstrap of unknown origin in foreground. Handmade bamboo reed in use.

Shetland wool striped fabric finished - about 8 x 100'“

What the skirt really needed, to be finished, was some elastic in the back half of the waistband, which I inserted in a sleeve of brown wool, a remnant from my lovely long skirt. And the buttons were pulling at the knitted fabric, so I wanted to add button bands. Another job for my new best friend, handwoven tape! I had some handspun tussah silk yarn in appropriate colors handy, and got to work. the cool thing is, being custom-made, the tape has woven-in buttonholes.

Hanspun tussah silk yarn, in natural, rust, and bronze.

I kept the skirt in my lap as I wove the buttonhole band, and buttoned each button as I went, so that the length between would be correct.

The skirt has already been recruited into use, but I don’t have fully-done photos yet. I’m sure you’ll see it underneath some weaving in progress eventually.
Meanwhile, how about some sleeve gussets? The next FO is actually a radical mending, or a reboot. A linen dress I’ve had for a very long time, love dearly, and never liked the fit of the sleeves. In sewing a linen shift, I learned a thing or two about gussets, and I wanted to apply that to this dress. But the sleeves were joined into the princess cut in such a way that merely adding gussets in the underarm was not enough. I had to cut the whole sleeve off and insert a wedge at the shoulder.

The linen dress on my work table, one sleeve reconfigured. The original sleeve is angled so low that anytime I raised my arms, it was too tight around the upper arm. Simply adding room below did not solve this problem - I had to reduce the angle from the shoulder, make it nearly straight out.

I’d been searching for linen of a harmonious color for these insertions, but my smart friend Ann suggested using a print fabric that shows right up, and carrying the insert all the way to the sleeve hem. Which sent me stash diving and gave me the joy of using more long-held fabrics to not only enhance function but jazz up this dress.

Whee, freedom of movement! I’ve worn it many a day since making this change. Seen here with a necklace made of weaving-enhanced driftwood, work of my friend Tininha.

It’s interesting to think about what counts as ‘finishing’ in my little textile world. I meant to show things that are done, wearable, no more work left until they need mending. But I realized that each plied ball of handspun yarn is also a small finished object. There are many stages of finishing, and the sense of accomplishment comes whenever I wind off a ball or a skein of yarn.

Four balls of handspun yarn, from top left cotton 2 strand plying ball, Corriedale plied, Coopworth 2 strand plying ball, Gnomespun dyed Gotland 2 strand plying ball. All of these have been plied since the photo - woot!

My life is filled with balls of yarn like this. And I never know what will strike me when sorting, or moving, or plying, or grouping them. As it happened, I went through the main ‘weaving yarn’ bin the other day, and found the Syrian silk in there. This stuff is heavy, in more ways than one. It has weight. Just holding three skeins’ worth was like a presence - I held them against my stomach, as if carried in the womb, and I remembered the market in Damascus. The Souq al Hamidiyyeh, a huge covered arcade of market stalls where I searched for the yarn shop a friend in Doha recommended.

I was there the end of February, 2011, only months before the rapid disintegration of what was then normal life for Syrians. It is sobering to think of these places now, and the yarn holds all of that.

Shelves of the yarn shop where I bought my silk, Souq al Hamidiyyeh, Damascus, Syria.

I wove some of this silk once before, along with some textured corespun yarn in the warp and an additional wool yarn in the weft. The resulting scarf was sold to a friend at an art fair in Doha.

Handspun yarn and Syrian silk scarf, modeled on the roof of my Doha apartment, 2011.

As I realized then, this silk (I call it silk, it may have some viscose in it, but they said it was silk, even when my Arabic speaking friend bought it,) needs something to stabilize it, something less slippery and lighter weight. It occurred to me to try weaving it with plain, white, handspun wool. This juxtaposition of flashy, shiny, bling yarn and earth-grown, undyed sheep’s wool parallels what I encountered in Arab culture. There is a deep history of pastoral connection to land, animals, and hand-worked materials, which coexists with a love of gold, sparkling jewels, and lush adornment. Very broad strokes here, but I could give examples if this post were not already getting lengthy. Suffice to say, this combination felt right, as an honoring of the yarn’s place of origin.

Syrian silk yarn and handspun CVM/Romeldale cross wool from Bellingham, WA.

I probably want to make something large-ish, as the yarn allows, but first I needed to sample my idea. I spent much of a day working up this sample, and I can’t even express how much I adore the fabric.

Sunlight on weaving in progress.

The sun was shining on this day, and I enjoyed the glint of sunlight on silk immensely, broken up with all the little dashes of wooliness.

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A small sample, a tiny little piece of fabric, but I love everything about it, the hand, the texture, the rhythm of bright and matte surfaces, and the way the light shines through.

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The rug in the background is also from Syria, bought on the same brief visit. Through my own weaving, my heart honors and hopes for the place and the people, that they (and we all) may thrive in some new form.

motley

I’ve come to accept that I always have a motley collection of intentions, a patchwork of projects, each inching along at its own pace.

Warp-faced strip of two handspun merino/bamboo/silk yarns who have long awaited being woven together to see what happens.

The slow pace can sometimes drain the excitement, so that by the time I share or finish something, it’s already old to me.

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Handspun cotton accumulating in the to-be-washed pile.

But maybe the slow pace is the excitement, or the importance of the thing.
Not rushing can be a subversive, significant act.

Linen shift stitching in progress - felling a seam.

Valuing flashes of brilliance over steady accumulation of skill and knowledge is part of the prevailing illness today —- why not glory in taking a long time to slowly make a thing?

Which I do. In several different directions, all at once.

Twisting some fine cordage from long leaves. Love the fineness, but the fingers get tired, and my joins need work.

Closeup of backstrap woven bath mat in progress, with weft of cotton t-shirt strips and carved Allen Berry sword beater.

I wanted to share an update on my 18th century-style petticoat skirt, mentioned at the end of this post. The fabric is so light that the skirt simply crawled up my legs when I walked in it, so something needed to be done. I thought of adding a handwoven hem band, probably getting the idea from Lao skirts and the separate hems they often add to the main skirt fabric. Looking at the photos, I realize now that even when a separate hem is not sewn on, the additional woven decoration at the bottom adds weight (as in the second photo below.)

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Lao tube skirt (pha sinh) - the ikat upper part is the main skirt, the brocade weaving below is a separately woven hem section.

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These pha sinh are woven in one piece, but the borders are decorated with supplementary (brocade) patterning.

One of my narrow woven wool bands looked good against the skirt fabric, but I wanted the hem band wider. So I scaled up the pattern using my handy Inkle Visualizer app, and wound a warp in the same colors, closer to 2”/5 cm wide. As often happens, I miscalculated length because I don’t have a good sense of takeup percentage (how much length is lost in the weaving), so I ended up with a nice hem band that was about a handspan and a half too short.

Backstrap-woven, handspun wool hem on petticoat.

What to do? Standing in my studio, the stacks of folded fabric catch the eye, and in my life “patchwork” is more than just a metaphor. The solution was obvious.

Patchwork fabric infill, at the back of the skirt hem where the woven band did not reach.

I actually padded the patchwork strip with batting, and put in some quilting stitches along the seams for strength, since the patchwork needed to be equal to warp-faced woven wool. Solving these little problems of durability, weight, and behavior in garments teaches so much about how and why people made clothes in various ways, throughout time and place!

And the tiny bit of quilting sparked something else, the memory of my love for that act, that set of skills and motions. As it happens, I had a fully assembled, partially quilted project handy to get back into the joy of hand quilting. This is a 20-year-old piece with its own story, which I will feature at another time. Suffice to say it has a theme of colonization, refugees, and war, which unfortunately never ceases to be relevant. Meanwhile, I also find it beautiful and highly evocative, with memories of Dharamsala, India, where it began.

Patchwork quilt in hoop and on the floor below, big basting stitches and quilting stitches shown in the hoop.

Hand quilting in progress, red thread on cotton and Tibetan silk fabric patches.

Even these photos are already a few months old, because I somehow got distracted from working on this, as well….. As I said, it’s a constant, swirling dance of discovery, my inching along with each project as the mood strikes. But the stitching here may have fed into the stitching on the linen shift, which is nearing completion. It’s all moving, deepening and spreading like water filling a dry, rutted patch of earth. Something will grow here, surely.

Self in linen shift, showing finished neckline and cuffs, in nice afternoon light.

reinforcement

I love weaving tape! Plain weave tape with warped-in design is enormously gratifying right now. It’s a way of always having weaving in progress that is simple, straightforward, and practical. It’s also a way of using handspun yarn that I may not have enough of to make something larger, but I want to see how it functions in a weaving. The tussah silk above is a good example of that - and I’m very happy with it as warp-faced tape. I feel like making a whole garment of some kind, just for the sake of using that silk tape as an edging.

Being preoccupied with weaving tape means I’m noticing garment edgings more, such as these details on Uzbek robes, again from the beautiful Susan Meller book Silk and Cotton: Textiles from the Central Asia that was. All the robes have edging, some of which is embroidered, some woven on with a “loop manipulation” technique that I’d like to research further, and some woven separately and sewn on. It makes sense, these were hard-wearing garments, meant to last through many years of daily use, and the edging protects and reinforces the most vulnerable parts of the cloth.

This is also the reason and rationale for the card-woven hem that Morgan Donner recreated, using the Medieval Garments Reconstructed book, which analyses archaeological textiles found in Greenland. And it’s why I decided to try the technique on my recently completed long wool skirt. In fact, I think weaving this edging did even more for getting me interested in exploring garment edgings, and noticing their various manifestations.

Shetland from a sheep named Kevin, Superior Fibers in Edmonds, WA. Romney lambswool from One Straw Ranch, Nordland, WA.

The skirt after sewing was finished, prior to adding woven binding. This is my winter uniform: handspun sweater, long-sleeved shirt, scarf, handknit hat, wool skirt, boots (leggings underneath.) I can put together an outfit made by me except for leggings, underpants and boots - but in this case I did not make the shirt or scarf.

The beautiful Italian wool suiting from my skirt has a deep brown warp and a charcoal grey weft, both of which were wools available in my stash (surprise, surprise!) I spun up some of the dark brown Romney lamb and the grey Shetland, both from nearby sheep farms, and got out the cards from my 2017 class with John Mallarkey, and got to it.

Card weaving in progress. The tricky part was figuring out how to hold it, to keep the shed open, tension on, stitch the weft through, etc. Hand had to learn the best method to avoid hours of awkwardness. The point nearest me is pinned to my belt, and the far end attached to a clamp on the table.

Hem view of nearly finished cardwoven binding.

This was quite the learning experience (hint: Morgan makes it look extremely easy), but so gratifying to see a sturdy, handwoven binding develop along the hem. The weight and density of it enhances the twirl factor of this skirt, giving it a liveliness as I move around, and it has become even better suited to my inclination to wear it ALL the TIME this winter.

And you know, I didn’t even realize I was going to talk about that, but it is closely related to this narrow tape weaving, and all of a piece with investigating handmade clothing and the relationship with my weaving and spinning. The other thing that made band weaving extra fun was the new release of Inkle Visualizer, a charting software application for warped-in plainweave designs (no inkle loom required, as long as you can weave warp-dominant construction.) It’s essentially a digital coloring book, making the testing out of stripe patterns very quick and entertaining. My tussah silk band motif came from my Inkle Visualizer experimentations, as did the design for the handspun wool band below.

Spindles-spun wool in heathered green, deep purple, pale orange and bright orange with warped-in design. Ball of green handspun wool.

My only regret for the ones that work well is that I did not make a longer warp. So far I haven’t done more than a couple of yards, but I’m thinking of trying some longer lengths, to store up some serious yardage for future use. The ones that aren’t long enough to use as garment edgings can always be ties for backstrap weaving, or bundling things, or as tape for making hanging tabs on dish towels, or as straps on bags…. I’m convinced they will all come in handy somehow.

My handwoven tape stash so far: six tapes, mostly cotton, one handspun wool, one handspun silk.

madder, indigo, persimmon, cloth

So why all this knitting and spinning and weaving and sewing and stuff? Well yes, handmade clothes and fabrics are wonderful, but the truth is, many of us do this because we love handling the materials. Fiber, yarn, and cloth are sources of discovery and wonder, and so we’re forever coming up with new ways to explore with them and through them.

Ending up with reliable results is a sign that we are gaining in knowledge and skill, but getting there is often most of the fun - including the dreaming stage, the beholding of some material that compels us, either ineffably or viscerally. The Japanese shirting was doing that to me. Both the ochre version from which I made my petticoat, and this striped blue and neutral. They kept talking to me, insistently, requiring that I pay attention to them. I realized the striped one reminded me of indigo and persimmon, natural dye colors that are commonly seen in Japanese textiles.

I bought a remnant, again (when I can’t think of a concrete project for a fabric, I wait for it to be a remnant, then bring it home as a pet.) This sat in my basket, on view, for a while. Here it is with a Japanese indigo dyed piece my husband bought me while we lived in Japan (late 1990’s). It is loosely woven asa fabric - asa is a generalized term for native plant fibers, from what I can tell. The base yarn is colored with persimmon (kaki) and overdyed with indigo, in a way that involves folding and dipping.

Striped Japanese shirting and indigo/persimmon dip-dyed plant fiber cloth, detail.

Large scarf made of plant fiber dip-dyed with tapered horizontal stripes of indigo in alternating light and dark tones. Creased from being folded….

I found that I had enough for a sleeveless bodice, and began looking for a skirt. Enter one more beloved Thai sarong. This is apparently the year for me to use my Thai sarong fabrics. I wore this one quite a bit. It was a functional garment already, and had been sewn into a tube. When I put it next to the Japanese shirting and knew they belonged together, it struck me that this fabric also had a natural dye referent - it reminds me of madder and indigo. It’s not even a true batik, just a print, but I suspect that people dye and print commercial fabrics with colors that are traditionally pleasing, consciously or unconsciously hearkening back to natural dyes.

Print sarong, showing underside. Intricate batik-style patterns in shades of pink/brown and indigo blue, with black and white highlights.

Button band of sewn bodice, with 19th century China buttons in blue and white. These are my first machine sewn buttonholes, ever.

I don’t have to go far to find examples of madder and indigo among my fibers and fabrics. They are my favorites, and make their way into the stash with ease.

Madder-dyed wool spinning in progress, on a Peruvian spindle. I dyed the fiber in a workshop with Local Color Fiber Studio of Bainbridge Island. The weaving underneath I made with my rigid heddle loom, two shades of indigo cotton from Laos.

Working with these colors and fabrics is the joyful part - placing them next to each other, seeing how they communicate and what they have to tell me. Being able to wear what I make with the fabric, practicality meets delight. I made a sleeveless Hinterland dress which may serve as an undergarment until it gets warm out again.

Detail of dress, Japanese striped shirting on top, China buttons, Thai sarong on the bottom. Soothing blue and muddy cinnamon….

Another example of persimmon (painted onto stencil paper for use in stitch resist dyeing) and indigo (handmade paper made and dyed by Laura Mayotte.)

Natural colored flax yarn, spun by me, indigo dyed hemp yarn from Rainshadow Fibers, a Japanese bag made from plant fiber and dyed with indigo and possibly persimmon, but maybe walnut, underneath.

I’ve done that thing again, where I write about another topic and put it on a different page. Still thematic to the textile riches of my life, a contemplation of a camel trapping in the threads page.

sturdiness

Another couple of garments, or more.

I’ve been on a quest to make clothes that are suitable for yard work and walking in the woods, because on any given day I may suddenly start doing one of those things, and it can be inconvenient to have to change clothes first. So comfortable, warm layers that also work for outdoor work or adventure. I knew I wanted skirts. I love wearing skirts. The only problem with skirts is that they are often designed to not be sturdy, but flowy, or dressy, and such garments are liable to catch on things, and tear easily, and otherwise cramp one’s style in the forest. But there’s no reason a skirt can’t be a perfect forest garment, if made from the right fabric. So when my husband gave me some old khakis for the donation pile, my mind went ka-ching!

Plotting and scheming - my sewing notebook has the idea and measurements, fabric is being auditioned for pockets. I added the orange fabric by sewing one side to the khaki, then putting it on my body and drawing a line where the other seam needed to be to give me enough flare. Not very scientific.

Inverted leg of khaki pants, spread flat and bordered by orange cotton blend - half the skirt in side view, with drawstring, before pockets.

It so happened that a trouser leg, cut open and free from pockets, waistband and zipper, then flipped so the cuff is on top, is just the right size for the side of a skirt. The two cuffs nearly fit around my waist, and I just had to fill the front and back wedges with another strong cotton cloth. I had this orange stuff from Thailand - may be part synthetic, so I wasn’t in love with it, but for this purpose it was just right. Threaded a drawstring through the cuffs-now-waistband, and added huge pockets using some of my hand-dyed fabric (also unloved, in theory, but perfect for this job - it’s amazing how that happens.)

Side view of garden skirt, showing full inverted trouser leg panel, with large yellow & green pocket, discharge dyed with square grid stencil.

Back hip pocket with secateurs, taken while on my body, so not great. Pocket cloth is brown Thai sarong fabric, same as back of Lichen Duster skirt.

This immediately worked as a gardening skirt. All I had to do was add a back hip pocket, since my secateurs are hard to retrieve from the voluminous side pockets. What a revelation, that a pant leg works as a skirt panel. I hope Sharon Kallis is proud - it’s the sort of thing she would figure out. I would plan to do this again & again, except that this skirt will probably serve me for a good long time. It is hard to give away high quality fabric, though, so if more donation pants come my way, maybe in a darker color…..?

The second new garment is made of new fabric. When I saw the rust denim for sale at District Fabric, I knew it would be my next Sturdy Outdoor Garment. Priority wardrobe items for me are those I can throw on over top of whatever else I’m wearing. I am big on layering, and live in a place conducive to it. In the last couple of years, most of the clothes I’ve made are of the tunic/apron/jumper genre. (And I say jumper in the American sense, not the British sense of sweater or pullover.) This rust denim jobbie is what I grew up thinking of as a jumper. As you can see, it goes on over everything I’m wearing, in this case sweatpants and a wool sweater (a jumper over a jumper, wot?) And yeah, I’m really happy with it.

Rust denim jumper over sweatpants and neutral wool sweater, as worn indoors (over my basic house clothes, that is)

Huge pockets again, an enlarged version of those from the Odacier Elizabeth Shannon apron, which I’ve made three times now. For the dress itself, I started with a base of 100 Acts of Sewing Dress No.3, and made large armholes in place of sleeves - I did sew a mock up of the top section, to check the fit. This is such a great, warm, rugged outer layer. It’s exactly what I need and has been into the woods with me several times already.

Ok, this is a lot of clothing and sewing and me pictures, so here, have some clouds and sky.

Clouds and tree silhouettes over the bay and the low, distant mountains. A beautiful evening.

I gotta say, for everything I write about here, there are a dozen things I don’t write about. There are usually about a gazillion thoughts in my head that I would love to share, but the process of getting those into this “space” in a meaningful way is kind of clunky, and so there is usually less here than I intended to include.

Anyway, we’re still on the theme of making clothes. Another category of clothes I love is the underlayers. I’m happy when I can put something on over everything, or under everything, and I made an underneath layer recently, too. At some point during perusal of historical clothing and sewing videos, I saw the 18th century style of petticoat, which is made from two rectangles, with a split at the top, and tied from back to front, then from front to back on top of that. This struck me as brilliant, because cloth is not cut and shaped and yet, it can be sized large enough and gathered at the top to fit nicely. I am a big fan of rectangular cloth as garment, but in many cases, such as Southeast Asian sarongs, the fit leaves something to be desired on this body. I knew the 18th C petticoat would work, and I fully enjoyed the calm demonstration of its construction by Burnley and Trowbridge on YouTube.

Detail of the slit where the two halves join below the waistband. There is a small bar tack sewn at the base of the slit, instructions for which are included in the B & T video. This is one of my favorite details!

Super closeup of the tape, sewn to the pleated top edge of the skirt. I did all the basting recommended in the video, which gave an added sense of security. Color is more true in this image. The shirting looks ochre yellow overall, and is actually woven from dark brown, rust orange, and bright yellow threads.

I had two remnants of a beautiful Japanese shirting fabric that I bought for the admiration of it, not knowing what it would become. This is cotton, but it’s a tight weave, so as a layer, it adds warmth. I often wish for something underneath skirts or dresses, and like my other handmade garments, this is not part of a conscious outfit, but a needed element that will fit nicely who-knows-when (or possibly all the time.) The tape I was weaving a couple of posts ago was finished with enough length to make the back and front ties, and I stitched the entire thing by hand, just because. Half the reason I sew clothes is to work with the nice fabric, so sewing by hand adds to the pleasurable experience - and this was an exercise in honing my hand-sewing skills (that video really got me going - see captions.)

Apron pattern from Odacier on Etsy. I have another one of these, closed-back style, that I wear All The Time. It can be thrown on over everything for instant presentability and pockets!

Back of apron. I had fun centering the floral motifs of the sarong - and the floral border at the bottom was a serendipitous surprise.

Here’s a picture of me wearing the petticoat, under the Elizabeth Shannon apron I impulsively made from another long-treasured Thai sarong. See? The petticoat is going to go with everything. And this is apparently use-the-sarongs year. I’ve sewn no less than four into garments, so far. I know! I’m making tons of clothes! But it’s constructive self-soothing, and for the most part I own the fabrics already, or have long wanted the type of garment being made.

As the post title says, the point lately has been sturdiness. Each of these should last for years and years, and I’m not afraid to get out and do stuff in them. They can handle it, which is another reassuring aspect of this activity. Nothing like being able to make what you need, and knowing that it’s well made.

time of two robes, part 2

I call the shelter-in-cloth robe Inhabit, and I call this one Flourish. This one, made from the Sew Liberated Lichen Duster pattern, is more suited for showing off, going out, being seen.

I challenge anyone to resist twirling in this duster.

May still have the stay-at-home face, but I’m working on that.

While I love to wear a big huge square or rectangular garment, there is something to be said (in this my home culture), for the slightly more fitted and tailored look. I mean, here’s a beautiful huipil that I wear an awful lot. I got it at the weaving guild auction, knowing it was handspun cotton, and later found out from Charlotte Kwon at Maiwa that it’s from Oaxaca, Mexico.

The Oaxaca huipil stack, Maiwa collection, Vancouver, B.C.

Backstrap woven cloth, being normally not very wide, is suited to big huipils, ponchos, and mantas made of panels joined together. This one is three panels wide. It feels so secure to be completely swathed in handspun cotton, giving away no hint of actual body shape. I dream of hanging out with these women in Chicahuaxtla, and trying out the floor-length huipil. (Instagram link, because otherwise I’m only getting Pinterest, and I’d rather send you to Ana Paula Fuentes.)

But the Lichen Duster! It’s a completely different approach, very distinctively shaped pattern pieces, meticulous and fascinating construction. It’s kind of the opposite of the Cut my Cote zero waste method - however, I did discover that the pieces are narrow enough (apart from sleeves and upper back) that one could use handwoven fabric of 14” wide to make most of them. Exciting! Food for thought!

And since I intended to use fabric I already owned for this first duster, it was a process of matching fabric to pattern piece, based on size. I started by printing and cutting out the pattern pieces (size 12, for roominess,) so that I could see exactly what was needed. I rummaged around in my bins, prioritizing some Indian khadi (handspun cotton) first. I have a large but dwindling amount of this, but individual pieces are not all that big. At the time of collection, I was buying a meter or so of each, just going for variety not quantity. I actually had to piece the two front khadi panels to get long enough sections - those center front pattern pieces wrap behind the neck to form the collar, so they’re long.

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Close up of two khadi fabrics. The upper left piece is used in my duster (from the pockets to the hem, side front.) The other one plays a bit part in the Inhabit robe.

As soon as I saw the dark brown Thai sarong in my bin, I knew it had to be used for the gores, at least. Since living in Thailand in 2004, I’ve used, worn, and given away a number of different sarongs, but this one I always held onto as fabric, because it’s so striking. The audacious color combination - deep chocolate, with a rusty dark cinnamon brown, and bright fuchsia, black, white, and taupe - it had to be featured someday. Letting those flowers peek out at the base of the skirt sounded perfect, and as it happened, I needed this for the center back skirt as well, since other fabric pieces were not big enough.

A little more rummaging produced a very large piece of cloth, one I’d dyed myself during the year I studied with Stanley Pinckney at SMFA in Boston. I want to link you, but Stanley is not an online-presence kind of man. Utterly brilliant as a teacher, he created an ideal space for cooking up far-ranging ideas, through the medium of Adire, resist dye techniques as practiced by the Yoruba of western Nigeria.

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Triptych made in Stanley’s class, using the eleko technique of wax resist. The wax was applied with wood blocks, which I cut and made myself. Stanley convinced me to make a “negative space” block, with the pattern removed from the block, to add depth and texture to the resist dyed design. The middle panel has an underdye of elo, the technique of binding and wrapping.

I could go on indefinitely about Stanley and his class, and his shipshape studio, and the slides he showed weekly of all his former students’ work, and the way he asked, “Are you plotting and scheming??” with a wicked grin on his face. Rarely have I encountered such unequivocal support and such systematic, organized teaching by someone passionate, focused and full of love for the work. So when I put this eleko fabric into this robe, it speaks all of that. It reminds me of how much I loved that studio, and how hard I worked that year. This piece was not ‘finished,’ but in its current state of pale lavender with sage green and the blush of pink, it somehow harmonizes with the fabrics I’d chosen. And it was plenty big enough for sleeves and (almost) upper back, so that brought me to here.

I laid the fabrics out, mimicking the robe shape, and was satisfied that this would work, visually. After that came the focused effort. It was remarkable how this project fit my needs at this stage of pandemic, isolation, mourning, outrage, and so on. Earlier, I needed the amorphous pulling together of cloth that was the Inhabit robe - no plan, just basting and adding stitches, solving problems in a loose, musing, stream-of-consciousness way, knowing I could always backtrack and take stitches out. At this point, I was ready for some step-by-step, intricate puzzle work. I’d read the pattern, looked at the tutorials, and even sampled all the different seams that might be used, so I was fluent and prepared. There was something appealing about doing everything just right, honing skills and being meticulous. It engaged my mind in an all-consuming way, which was a different sort of productive ‘escape,’ or let’s say alternative to the spiral of worry, despair or frustration that daily threatens. Because I don’t think making clothes is running away from anything - more of a running towards the priorities I wish to see reinforced. This project made me learn, think, and do in a very satisfying way.

Intersection of khadi and sarong, at pocket and front gore. The pocket construction is so cool.

And a secret, hidden fabric on the inside of the pockets - a good way to stretch the featured ones, since this part is folded in. I used a lighter weight fabric, to reduce the bulk of pocket seams.

I used FOUR different seams on this baby: flat felled for the back of the skirt, bound seams on the front, French seam to join back skirt and upper back, and faux-French for the sleeve join. Only a small amount of hand-sewing, on those sleeve seams, otherwise my trusty machine was a trooper.

And as I was saying at the beginning, a more tailored look. This pattern is so classy. I was pretty sure it would allow me to use a variety of fabrics while avoiding a radically eccentric, motley effect. I wanted it all to hang together and be convincing, and the structure helps with that. The collar, for example. With interfacing, the collar and front edge are nice and crisp. I didn’t even mess with the collar during this photo shoot - it behaved itself without intervention. Belted, this is a functional dress, suited for working with my hands and puttering around, which is key. I don’t need garments I can’t work in. A scarf was handy for immediate belting, and I’m working on a backstrap woven belt, using some sock yarn as warp.

Well, that’s about it. I may have forgotten things I wanted to say, and please ask questions in the comments if you have any. I’m quite sure I’ll be making this again - there are so many possibilities. Oh, the front facing cloth was over-dyed with walnuts, back in May. I collected them last fall and let them steep all winter long (the neglect-on-the-deck technique.) Shown below is my little Dye All the Things Walnut fest. The deflected double weave is a scarf made by Pauline Verbeek-Cowart, an esteemed weaver, teacher, and good friend. It was a snowy white, which was beautiful but I’d never wear it. Now it’s ready-to-wear, and will go with my Flourish duster! And hey, it’s almost time to gather more walnuts….

One more thing: if you live in the United States, please check that you’re registered to vote, please vote, and if you want to help ensure the process, here’s a website called Power the Polls.

time of two robes, part 1

Back in April (insert joke about how long ago that was), Jude Hill had this concept of ‘shelter in cloth as place.’ A compelling idea. I haven’t been hand-stitching much lately, but was drawn to the project of finding some cloth and living with and in it. I have plenty of cloth worthy of that task. I thought of the word inhabit.

This is the robe, Inhabit

This is a Lichen duster - will post more soon!

Jude’s paper doll measuring method and rectangle base provided an easy way to get started.

This post, where Jude plays with the plain rectangle as robe base, and all its many possibilities, gave me a way in. My own lifelong fabric stash provided the rest.

The robe was built from the inside out, because the first cloth I knew I wanted to live in was silk charmeuse dyed by Laura Mayotte, aka indigonightowl. It was in a gift packet years ago, and I’d always wanted to wear it close, but hadn’t come up with the right garment. So this piece became the inner lining, embracing my shoulders and back, full of the good energy of indigo and friendship.

You’d need to feel this - it’s like water, so soft.

A robe! A cloth with neck opening, tra-la…

The main outer rectangle is more silk. I know, so indulgent, all this silk. But I owned it already, this time from my art school dyeing course with Stanley Pinckney, who required us to work huge, practicing resist dye techniques on 5 x 8 foot pieces of cloth, in order to immerse and become proficient. I had a large piece of silk shantung that was dyed with a wonderful color - Procion MX “Pearl Grey”, which turns mauve on this silk, overlaid with a couple of long stripes. Like Laura’s indigo piece, this cloth was already soft as if worn for years, mellowed by the dyeing process. I took Jude’s advice and tried it on from the earliest stages.

I immediately basted these fabrics together, and they let me know right away that this was good.

Cutting open the front from the neck down.

The next thing I knew for sure was that the front would cross over in the Asian style, and Hmong batik hemp would be the collar. The extra piece for the front was again silk, from a dye workshop at the first fiber festival I ever attended, in Sedalia, Missouri. We used resist and stamping techniques with natural dye extracts (I forgot the teacher’s name but she used to own Table Rock Llamas in Colorado Springs.) These precious and unique fabrics had rested in my storage bins for years, awaiting their time. The Hmong batik came from the night market in Chiang Mai, Thailand, around 1998. Well-worn and still pleated from its life as a skirt, this cloth is not only soft and strong, but full of the skill of ages.

I stitched the long seams with the machine, but for the collar I worked by hand. Dwelling with this robe meant slowing down, which was part of the appeal. Of course the world in general was slowed by the stay-at-home orders, but my mind still buzzed, and I was not inclined to sit still. Once I started the robe, I found that it gave me pleasant problems to solve, questions and puzzles to occupy my mind deep in the night, a welcome change from random worrying and wondering about questions with no answers. I’d lie there and think about how to attach a button, or what fabrics might be best for the next step. Basting and hand sewing also gave me the chance to admire these fabrics which had been dormant for so long, like the glorious Japanese printed silk I used for the lower half of the lining.

I put a button on both sides, so it can be worn inside out.

The stitching and patchwork has gone slowly, after the initial rush of choosing and assembling the large pieces. I’ve added pockets (obviously essential, as soon as I started wearing it), and select bits of special fabric, even thoughts and hopes.

Another sample of Laura Mayotte’s indigo work became a medallion on my shoulder.

Embroidering a word makes you think about it more.

For the back of my neck, a place of vulnerability I want to transform.

This one is certainly not yet “done”, and I don’t know if it will be, ever. I’m sure there will always be something else to stitch. It’s also unrefined - very little of the stitching is as precise or tidy as this embroidered label. Some of it feels almost desperate - but such are the moods flowing through and around me lately. The main guiding idea is still to inhabit the cloth, and the robe is serving that purpose, welcoming me to wrap up on a cool morning. I reinforced the lower back lining with Japanese cotton, wanting some strength in there for outdoor sitting.

This robe may be silk, but it’s not meant for disengaging from the world. I wear it like anything else, for wandering in the wooded garden, for spinning and general household puttering. It is a stay-at-home garment, but that’s not the same as stagnant. It’s a reminder that the skill of my own hands can keep me company and guide a troubled mind, while reinforcing a supportive place in which to dwell. In my wanderings I have gathered and made these fabrics, and now that I’m staying home for a while, I inhabit them.

Basting the layers allowed me to keep wearing the robe as it was made. Sleeves of handspun cotton khadi from India, which are shaped because the fabric was cut for pant legs.

And yes, I did say two robes. I made a Lichen Duster - and it’s done, too! Shown up at the top of the post. But it deserves its own post with lots of photos. Coming soon….

a day in the life

Sometimes it feels that not much is happening, but still there is a lot going on. Just on a small scale. I'm preparing to travel, and trying to finish up (or start) a few things before I go. It seems that I always have fiber-project deadlines in the days before any trip.

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There is quilting in progress, a quick stitching up for a new small person I will meet.

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And there is spinning, or more accurately, plying, of handspun cotton with handspun silk, then with itself, then cabled with the first 2-ply. Making a yarn strong enough to incorporate with some cotton/acrylic for a WIP. 

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Also in the middle of transforming handspun into a very warm scarf/cowl. But this does not need to be finished this week, so it's resting in a basket.

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Then there's the random casting on, unrelated to anything that Needs to Be Done.

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I love this stage of a toe-up sock. Like a little talisman on three needles, it holds so much potential - and it grows so fast at this stage, with all the anticipation of a new beginning. It's good to have socks on the needles again.