Kasuri Perfectionism

Ikat and Kasuri are the words commonly used to describe the process of dying a design into the threads before they are woven on either/both the warp and weft. Here are just a few images to see how fine and elegant the Japanese masters have taken this art. The warp and weft are finely resisted with cotton thread and then dyed. Several colors can be dyed onto a single thread. The non repeating patterns of the weft are painstakingly copied from a pattern and marked with a sumi dipped piece of bamboo.

1500 Years of Silk Weaving in Yuki Villages

Eleven students and I paid a visit to the Yuki area north of Tokyo in Ibaragi and Tochigi prefectures on Tuesday. The area is famous for producing the world's only unspun/thrown type of silk weave in the world. The ikat/kasuri rolls of silk for one kimono go for about $20 000 - $60 000 US dollars.

What a brilliant day. We visited four different organizations. Each extremely informative and friendly. We were all taken aback and impressed beyond words.

The fabrics were heavenly. The craftspeople talented and patient beyond words.

1500 years of painstakingly making silk floss and pulling it into fine threads..not spinning or reeling it. There are 40 different steps between the silk cocoon and the finished roll of silk. Each step requiring extraordinarily care and well...1500 years of perfectionism.

I could fill a moths blog on just that one day excursion. I wanted to see some specific parts of the entire process to fill in some technical holes in my own work.

I wanted to look carefully at the Japanese technique of making a thread heddle set. We watched a master at work for an hour and I learned volumes from her resourceful and graceful hands.

Lotus

I hauled this inside this morning to keep it out of the sun and so that the students could enjoy the blooms. I also put my back out doing it. It was a slow class.

Yukata Designs

Seven students have decided to make linen/cotton shibori summer kimono and are making small small samples of shibori techniques to decide what pattern they like the best. Ogata san went all out and tried shirokage shibori. The square checked one. It was too much work so she decided that she won't attempt a 12 meter version. It would take several hundred hours to complete. I'm looking forward to seeing the complete yukatas before the heat of summer sets in.

University Students

We had a lucky break in the rainy season for a group of university students who came over and dyed some tenugui. It always amazes me that even with the exact same technique each persons tenugi comes out different.

A new backstrap loom class for beginners.

Three very enthusiastic students have made up a Friday class. To keep it interesting I have all three of them weaving something slightly different. Koike san is weaving saki ori for the first time. (Actually it was the first time she wove anything today.) I had some old silk kimono lining that I dyed with madder and Lac. Perfect to rip into fine strips and weave.

Takeshima san is weaving some fine white paper thread she will later surface design with indigo and persimmon tannin.



Kameii san is weaving a gorgeous random indigo hemp stripe. Picture to come.

My Karma is going to pay for this..

I 'll probably be born as a silkworm in my next million lives ( A rough estimate of the number of silkworms I will have raised and then killed in this life.) and for eternity face one of the several choice fates the silkworms have faced because of me.

Left alone the silk moth will melt a hole in the cocoon ten days after the silkworm had spun it in order to escape and mate. The cocoon would then be useless for reeling with breaks in the continuous fiber. So I have to kill the chrysalis. There are a few techniques. Slightly salting the cocoons to dry them. Boiling and then reeling before the moth is formed. Keeping them in the fridge for a long cold slow death or placing them on the scorching hot tin metal roof on my kitchen to dry out in the sun.

Today I used the hell-hot-roasting-roof to do the trick.