Knitting might be one of the most common crafts today, practised around the world, with many countries and regions having their own traditions and patterns. How did Shetland manage to garner attention and enthusiasm for its local traditions, how are these traditions changing, and what does it mean for local knitters that practitioners from as far as the USA or Japan knit their patterns and want to learn their technique? And what is the connection between crofting and knitting in Shetland’s wool heritage today?

Heritage and commercialism

For hundreds of years, Shetland had been known for its textile industry. ‘Industry’ might not be the right term here, because although weaving and knitting have been mechanised and modernised, they were never industrialised. These days, most items are made using knitting machines, but finished by hand, resulting in top quality garments. Knitting has always been a commercial craft, mostly carried out by women. With little access to transportation and often living remotely, scattered across the islands, many women would stay at home and knit. They would travel into town once a week to sell their goods. 

Although they would knit for the people around them as well, as soon as young girls were taught to spin and knit they were also taught this was a way to make money. Traditional patterns are designed in such a way that they can be knitted fast, to optimise production. When Fair Isle knitting, in particular, became popular in the 1920s, demand for woollen items grew. Where commercialism and heritage craft are often seen as two opposing forces, in Shetland they have always been two sides of the same coin. 

When the offshore oil industry came to Shetland in the mid-1970s, this resulted in major changes in both women’s career prospects and their mobility. With other jobs offering better pay, knitting became a hobby at best. These days, the population of ‘commercial knitters’ is ageing: many are in their 70s and 80s. Some still take on commercial work finishing garments mostly. Their working relationships are intertwined with social relationships, a network designers or producers from the outside cannot easily tap into. Now the commercial side of knitting is less relevant, women tend to knit patterns they like, rather than commissions. When a well-known haute-couture brand came to the island, with the desire to honour local traditions and to commission more than 100 lace-knit dresses, they could not find any knitters who would take on that job. Although the craft is still popular, the commercial tradition, if you like, has changed. 

An additional consequence of knitting turning from a job to a hobby is that highly skilled knitters who would have traditionally made a living out of knitting, now knit for charity events or church sales, which operate at a very different price point. This has made it harder for those who do still knit commercially to ask a fair price for their products. 

Bringing outsiders in

The unique qualities of Shetland wool and woollen products have drawn outsiders to the islands for decades. They come to do research, often with the intention to share the outcomes, be it knowledge or patterns, with a wider audience. The local community did not necessarily support these outside researchers and would be reluctant to share their information. Still today, some are very protective of their patterns and techniques. There is a sense of wanting to protect the craft, not wanting outsiders to ‘steal’ a local tradition. 

Shetland Wool Week was set up in 2009 with the specific intention to draw outsiders to Shetland and create awareness of Shetland wool and woollen products outside of the islands. Initially, locals did not engage much with Shetland Wool Week: they considered it something for tourists. What made and continues to make Shetland Wool Week a success is a combination of two approaches. First, a good marketing strategy and secondly, a continuing commitment to engage locals who are involved in the wool industry in some way, from farmers to knitters. Let us focus on the latter first. 

When Shetland Wool Week began, it was part of a national (now international) event called Wool Week, organised by The Campaign for Wool, “in order to raise awareness amongst consumers about the unique, natural, renewable and biodegradable benefits offered by the fibre.” Wool Week was introduced to Shetland by Jamieson & Smith, a wool broker who buys wool from many Shetland farmers and who were involved with The Campaign for Wool. Jamieson & Smith teamed up with the Amenity Trust, which aims to safeguard Shetland’s heritage. A small event at first, Shetland Wool Week was seen by locals as an event for tourists. The Week’s organising committee has worked hard to involve the local community in a variety of ways. Part of the programme is provided by the organisation itself, but local organisations, designers and shop owners are encouraged to add to the programme. Their offer is vetted by the organisation and added to all communications and programme overview in exchange for a modest fee, while they get to keep the money made through ticket sales. 

The organisation aims to provide a programme that is as diverse as possible, from farm visits to knitting classes, from lectures to social events. Although some teachers are invited to the event from elsewhere and some events are not wool-related, the vast majority of the scheduled events should both have a link with local Shetland traditions and wool, from production to finished product. The organisation makes sure to emphasise the connection between the landscape, location and climate of the islands, the quality of the wool and local knitting traditions. Shetland textiles are part of Shetland culture and visitors to Shetland Wool Week are known to want to engage in all aspects of the islands and their traditions. The relatively small scale of the event and the connection with the local community are part of the success of Shetland Wool Week. To make this possible, locals had to be willing to participate. 

The organising committee first invested in relationships with experienced knitters, who were hired to teach several classes at the event. This meant these knitters could both make money from their finished product and also by teaching others how to knit in the Shetland tradition. Younger knitters are trained to become teachers themselves, to make sure this skill does not disappear either. As well as teachers, the organisation works with farmers and crofters, asking them to give tours of their farms and talk about their work. The organising committee advises farmers on creating an event that will match the expectations of participants. These farm visits provide an opportunity for farmers to explain their role in the production process. How do they work? What do the sheep need? What does the year cycle at the farm look like? Farmers also have an opportunity to shine a light on their position in a larger context and talk about the way EU laws affect their work. Shetland exists within Scotland, the UK, Europe, and local traditions and international laws do not exist independent of each other. On the one hand, Shetland Wool Week provides a wealth of opportunities to show and safeguard the complex web of traditions, skills and ways of life that all feed into the ‘wool identity’ of Shetland. On the other, it allows knitters from around the world to learn more about the background of the yarns they knit with or the patterns they love.

Managing expectations

After the first few years, Promote Shetland became involved in promoting Shetland Wool Week. Promote Shetland is tasked with raising awareness and informing tourists and prospective new inhabitants about Shetland. As such, they were perfectly placed to focus on the unique qualities of the location and local traditions, while also having a lot of experience marketing the local to an international audience. In late March, Edinburgh Yarn Festival is a highlight in many a knitter’s diary. It is here where Shetland Wool Week’s annual free hat pattern is released each year, creating a buzz around the festival which will take place in September. Once a team from Shetland Wool Week started attending the Edinburgh Yarn Festival, the number of national and European visitors grew considerably. The same happened with American knitters after a stall was booked at Vogue Knitting Live in Manhattan. 

To sum up, the first two steps of this successful campaign are: Be where our audience is and meet them there; Give something to our audience that is meaningful to them, in this case, a free pattern. The last, but certainly not least, important step in the campaign is to manage expectations. More than other destinations, Shetland Wool Week has to invest time and energy in creating a clear picture of what can be expected. Not only do knitters receive information about getting to and staying on Shetland, but they also need to understand the lay of the land, need to know that they will have to rent a car and wear walking shoes and weather-appropriate clothes. Take-out coffees are not readily available on every corner and American guests, in particular, are sometimes surprised to find the local supermarket does not, in fact, have a salad bar. What makes Shetland Wool Week, and Shetland wool, so unique: the location, the rugged terrain, the remoteness, the absence of a convention centre, needs to be communicated clearly to enthuse and to help people prepare.

What brings people to Shetland, even though they could stay at home and knit, is its ‘localness’: the place, the sheep, the people and the traditions. This results in new revenue streams for locals and a growing awareness of the quality of Shetland wool. The latter provides a commercial incentive to maintain the tradition, but also, interestingly, growing awareness of and appreciation for local traditions amongst locals. Shetland’s wool heritage is not something of the past but rather something of the present, and therefore it has a better chance of being something of the future as well. Local knitters have started recording their own traditions and writing their own pattern books, reaping the benefits and maintaining ownership, while sharing their culture with the rest of the world. And as for the question whether a non-native can ever become a Fair Isle knitter, there might be two different answers, depending on whether you solely focus on the technique and end-product, or whether the entirety of the craft and its traditions are included.

Crofting

Crofting is a form of small-scale farming, specific to the Scottish Highlands and Islands. Traditionally, a crofter would rent a house and some land from a landlord, although these days some crofters on the mainland own their own. On Fair Isle, there is only one landlord: The National Trust for Scotland. All crofters rent from this organisation. Rachel Challoner is not native to Shetland, but found herself running a croft after coming to the island for a temporary job. Traditionally, Fair Isle is a fishing community. Women would run the croft and knit, while the men were out at sea. For several decades now, the islanders know they are dependent on outsiders coming to the islands to keep up the population. A single female crofter with no direct ties to the island, Rachel has found herself becoming part of the island community. 

Going back a generation, the island had a stronger community, fuelled by social events. Crofting, however, still brings people together. For example, while the crofters tend to their own sheep and land on the south of the island, the roughly 300 sheep that roam the island’s northern part are a shared responsibility. Everyone comes together four times a year to bring down these wild sheep, to clip and shear them and provide medical care if needed. Crofters also take turns to check on the sheep and, during lambing season, their young. Mowing and baling the grass to prepare for winter, similarly gets the whole population involved. However, the population on the island is aging. Young families are encouraged to come to the island. Many do, but they might be more interested in living in the old house than taking on the croft itself. Of the eighteen crofts on the island, ten are now run by one family, who step in whenever a crofter becomes too old or when outsiders who are assigned the croft don’t want to run it. The change from an island of small crofts to one big farm threatens tradition. Because crofting is not very profitable, many traditional crofters had other jobs on the side, jobs that were crucial for keeping the island going: manning the fire station, crewing the boat, and air strip duties for example. Young families from outside might have other, sufficient types of income and are often not interested in these additional jobs. This too, can endanger traditional island life. Traditions involving religion, music and social gatherings, as well as the local museum, risk being lost if newcomers to the island are not interested in investing time and energy in becoming part of the community. 

Crofting and knitting

“In my brain I was a crofter on one side and a knitter on the other side. I don’t think of the two as intertwined. But because you contacted me, you got me thinking about the relationship between the two. The women doing both in itself was a tradition.” Even only thirty years ago, most knitters would also have been crofters. That is not the case anymore and Rachel sees great benefit in using Shetland Wool Week to engage knitters in the entire process, from crofting and raising the sheep to spinning the yarn and knitting local patterns. Changes to the wool industry have had a direct effect on Fair Isle crofters. Raising sheep for meat is now much more profitable than raising them for wool. As a consequence, all crofters on the island breed crosses that ensure a better meat production. Wool has become a by-product. All wool is sold to Jamieson’s of Shetland and everyone on the island knits with Jamieson’s yarn. Because Jamieson’s offers fairer prices than other wool buyers, it is still viable for crofters on the islands to sell their fleeces. Most sheep farmers on the UK mainland no longer sell their fleece at all, sometimes even resorting to burning them, as the sheep have to be clipped anyway. The price mainland farmers receive for their wool these days does not even cover the shipping costs.

Taking responsibility at a financial risk

Rachel has noticed a growing interest amongst hand knitters for small flock and single farm yarns. Through Instagram and Shetland Wool Week she has built up a network of knitters and after three years of research she has decided to return to raising Shetland sheep specifically for the quality of their wool. She can sell her yarn for a much fairer price to hand knitters specifically interested in her croft and flock. She has had to save up her fleeces for two years in order to have a large enough amount for a small spinning mill to be interested in taking her on as a customer. Jamieson’s cannot facilitate her request to keep her yarn separate from all the other yarn they process. Rachel decided to work with Uist Wool, a community mill, run as a social cooperative where yarn is not bleached or dyed and where they are happy to take on smaller batches of yarn. What’s more is that this mill, although not a Shetland business, is also located on a small island in the Outer Hebrides. This change required an upfront investment, but Rachel is hopeful it will pay off. Already, the income from selling her wool and knitwear means she no longer has to sell lambs for meat at the sales. 

“Living on Fair Isle comes with a bit of a responsibility. You don’t want to be part of the generation that lost fair isle knitting.” Most knitters and knitwear designers on the island still feel deeply connected with the island traditions, although many also modernise. They might use new colour combinations, for example, and the arrival of the Internet on the island a few years ago has made it possible for them to reach a global audience. Fair Isle knitwear is not protected: a lot of it is produced in a factory on the mainland, but ‘made on Fair Isle’ still holds meaning for some buyers. Fair Isle knitting and knitwear are still popular around the globe, but one does wonder what we lose when the traditional model of crofting is lost on the island.

Based on an interview with Dr Carol Christiansen, Curator and Community Museums Officer at the Shetland Museum and Archives and member of the Shetland Wool Week board, conducted on 7 October 2020, and an interview with Rachel Challoner, crofter on Fair Isle, conducted on 19 April 2021.

International webinar Waag: Technology as a means of preservation

Online, four heritage experts along with moderator Nicole McNeilly conducted an international webinar focused on how technology can be utilised to preserve heritage crafts. During the presentation, the audience learned more about the three Mingei pilot projects, on glassblowing, silk weaving, and mastic growing, which will create tools for heritage craft presentation and guide future research.

The Mingei project platform and different technologies like 3D reconstructions, used to preserve and represent heritage craft, were also demonstrated. Following the presentation was a panel on various topics like the inclusion of AI in craft preservation, how the Mingei project can serve to pass on informal heritage craft knowledge to a broad audience, and how this knowledge of the past can serve to inform our future.

rewatch the webinar

Local session Waag: Fashion as a thread between past and present

At Waag, creative Director Dick van Dijk provided an overview of the Mingei project and introduced the attendees to keynote speaker and renowned fashion designer Antoine Peters’ work, saying that it ‘looks into the past and provides new context’ for the future. During the keynote, Peters discussed several of his projects including his collaboration with the Zeeuws Museum. For the museum, he reimagined a traditional nineteenth-century garment from Zeeland, the yak, as a modern garment: the Jaktrui. In creating the Jaktrui, Peters ‘wanted to communicate something from the past to the now and translate it in my own way’. The zero-waste folding technique was then used for economic reasons, but now is very relevant from a sustainability perspective.

Following his presentation was a workshop on the craft of repairing clothing. This workshop was designed based on the Reflow project aiming to share knowledge on how to rethink, repair, and revalue your wardrobe. During this workshop, attendees were encouraged to rethink items of their own clothing focusing on both aesthetic and technique in clothing repair.

• Rewatch the workshop
• Watch the instruction
• View the photos of the workshop (photo credit: Jimena Gauna)
• An impression of the local sessions from the European partners will be published on the Mingei website.
   

How heritage can shape the future

So how does the Mingei project serve to connect the past, present, and future? Inspired by the Mingei movement in Japan, which originally served as a response to Western mechanisation in the mid 1920s, the Mingei project today focuses on the digitalisation and accessibility of heritage craft, both tangible and intangible.

Through use of modern technologies like interactive Augmented Reality and Mixed Reality, Mingei seeks to tell stories not only about the craft objects themselves, but about the rituals, practice, and knowledge that accompany these objects. The application of modern technology to heritage craft can then serve to build a bridge between the past and present.

In regard to the connection between past and present, Antoine Peters notes that ‘a design or a translation now always has this reference captured in it. So you have these little bridges – in storytelling or in the visual part’. When Peters was researching the yak, he found that no documentation existed detailing its construction proces – namely, how to take one piece of fabric and fold it to create the jak. Instead, he learned the folding technique from 91-year-old craftswoman Mrs. Vos.

This mirrors a challenge that was discovered during the Mingei project: during a glassblowing pilot in Paris, there was no documentation that outlined the movements and rituals of past glassblowers. Similar to the work Peters did to understand the historical process of crafting the yak, those working on the glass pilot had to find alternate methods to learn craft heritage techniques and movements and were able to reverse-engineer steps required for glassblowing. Both Peters and the glass pilot help to further an understanding of the past while contributing valuable knowledge to the future.

Through work like the Mingei project and Peters’ collaboration with the Zeeuws Museum, modern concepts and technologies can be applied to the past in a way that creates bridges between the past and present. When talking about heritage, Peters noted that the past and present cannot be separated; that ‘it’s all connected’. Examining these connections allows us to see the thread that connects the present day with the past and tells us stories that can be leveraged to imagine the future.

Exhibition CNAM Paris

CNAM organised an exhibiton where the worlds of academics and professional activity come together. It is the only higher education establishment dedicated to life-long professional training. A dedicated space at the cathedral which is part of the museum invites you to experience the craft of glassblowing and use actual glassblowing tools.

Local webinar FORTH – Greece

FORTH organised two webinars for Mingei Day (videos are in Greek).

Mingei Day Geneva – Reenacting 3D craft people

But Mingei Day is not over yet. On 9 and 10 July MIRAlab is organising a local session for Mingei Day in Geneva during The Night of Science. The partners main goal is to assure the perennity of certain gestures and attitudes when former people were doing crafts. Through digital simulation, we can preserve the intangible heritage.

Miralab intend to present videos of the “making of” of the digital craft people who are reproducing the gestures of our 3 activities: Glass, Mastic and Silk. As well as the setup of the three pilots.

In the last four years, Waag and nine European partners and craftsmen have experimented in Mingei project by documenting and digitalising crafts, storytelling, interactive Augmented Reality (AR), Mixed Reality (MR) and motion capture.

During this webinar on Mingei Day we would like to share and discuss the results and knowledge we gained. In four online panel discussions, experts from all over Europe will discuss and share their views on how to preserve crafts and how we can keep improving this in the future. During the webinar, participants will also have the opportunity to ask questions online.

Join the conversation! The link to the meeting will be provided to you by email. This event will be recorded.

Programme

16.00 hrs – Welcome Mingei Day – host Nicole McNeilly (Impact Evaluation Advisor Waag)
16.05 hrs – Introduction to Mingei Project (Xenophon Zabulis – Project Coordinator Mingei)
16.15 hrs – Expert panel discussion will cover the following questions:

1. What is the urgency of preserving and documenting crafts?
2. What is the impact for the craft and heritage community, education and future generations?
3. What tech advances are helping us make steps in the preservation and documentation of crafts?
4. How could the Mingei platform be useful for future users to make the impact sustainable?

17.35 hrs – Q&A from participants and recap lessons learned
17.45 hrs – Closing

Panelists

• Xenophon Zabulis – Research Director FORTH, project coordinator Mingei
• Carlo Meghini – Research Director at CNR-ISTI and developer Mingei platform
• Arnaud Dubois – Research Associate at CNAM, social anthropologist Mingei
• Eirini Kaldeli – Researcher and AI expert involved in the Crafted Europeana project
• Marinos Ioannides – UNESCO chair Digital Cultural Heritage at Cyprus University of Technology

Have a look at this episode of Euronews (Europe’s leading international news channel) dedicated to one of the many innovative ideas of Mingei that engage today’s youth with past traditions.  

This project has received funding from the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under grant agreement no. 822336.

Programme

19:15 – 19:30 hrs: Walk in
19:30 – 19:45 hrs: Introduction by Dick van Dijk (Creative Director at Waag)
19:45 – 20:15 hrs: Interview/presentation Antoine Peters
20:15 – 21:45 hrs: Workshop Reflow: Don’t let your textiles go to waste

Mingei Day

During the Mingei Day on March 10 we will provide insight into the research and applications of the Mingei project in an accessible manner. In the Mingei project, Waag works with European partners and craftsmen on ways to document traditional craft techniques. How can we use technology to preserve these crafts for the future? We do this, for example, by storytelling, interactive Augmented Reality (AR), Mixed Reality (MR) and motion capture. This way, the knowledge about the actions of traditional and industrial crafts can be preserved. During Mingei Day, passionate craftsmen show you what their craft is, and Waag shows you how you could document them.

Do you also want our crafts and clothing not to get lost? Come to Mingei Day on 10 March. Register if you want to be physically present in Waag’s Makers Guild (limited places available) and don’t forget your broken piece of clothing! You can also join the event from home. The link for the online live stream will be shared in the run-up to the event if you sign up.

Antoine Peters

The keynote of the evening is the worldwide famous fashion designer Antoine Peters. He has worked at Viktor & Rolf and worked with iconic brands such as Marcel Wanders, Moooi, United Nude, Quinze & Milan, Effio, Eastpak, Gsus Sindustries, EYE and Kidscase. Just like in Mingei, Antoine’s working method is characterised by his interest in traditional crafts.

In his work, Peters is concerned with the stories, historical development and conservation of these types of crafts. For example, he conducted intensive research into a nineteenth century yak for the Zeeuws Museum. He learned the craft of folding such a jacket, a technique that is more than two hundred years old, from a 92-year-old woman from Middelburg. She was one of the last wearers of the Walcheren regional dress. The uncomfortable fit of the yak gave the fashion designer the idea to use the traditional technique to make a sweater from soft recycled jersey.

Workshop

The necessity of preserving crafts, and the pleasure that these crafts can offer, are made clear in the workshop ‘Don’t let your textiles go to waste’. Did you know that in Amsterdam millions of kilos of textile end up in the wrong bin and are burned? And that people have an average of 170 pieces of clothing in their closet, 50 of which have not been used in the past year?

These workshops are designed to transfer knowledge on how to reuse, repair, reduce, rethink, recycle and revalue your wardrobe. During the workshops, developed within the Reflow project, you will learn how to repair holes in your clothing by rethinking the craft of clothing repair, and re-evaluating old garments.

Online streamers can already collect the following supplies:

An item of clothing you want to repair (socks, jumpers)
Wooden Embroidery Hoop
Wooden Darning Mushroom
Mixed colours of 100% Cotton Threads
Mixed colours of 100% wool Yarn
Chalk Pencil
A set of mixed needles and metal pins Darning needles
ruler and scissors

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DigiTraining is specifically targeted to benefit small or midsize museums, as well as other tangible or intangible cultural heritage organisations, which include structures and facilities accessible to the general public.

Mingei Online Platform 

Mingei Online Platform (MOP) is an online authoring platform developed in the Mingei H2020 IA, maintained and used in additional projects by FORTH, The Foundation for Research and Technology Hellas in Greece. The Mingei Online Platform facilitates the representation of the socio-historic context through narratives.

The purpose is to:

• Document, represent, and preserve intangible dimensions along with objects and sites
• Contextualise presentation of tangible heritage
• Systematise and facilitate the presentation of socio-historical context
• Explore and promote world heritage, stimulate interest through educational and fascinating content.

Nowadays, not only the treasures of culture but also the stories, the values, and the collective memories of European citizens can be preserved and enhanced through digitalisation. This platform is a useful tool for preserving both tangible and intangible Cultural Heritage, as users are able to add  information in such an easy way, by registering both texts (historical events, dates) and multimedia material, such as images, videos, 360^ο videos, 3d reconstructions, which are interconnected, creating relevant stories and narratives. In addition, the digitalisation of Cultural Heritage in combination with the creation of stories by using Mingei Online Platform (MOP) will stimulate visitors’ interest in tangible and intangible Cultural Heritage, making museums and cultural organisations more attractive.

Pilot

After its pilot evaluation, the Mingei Online Platform was utilised by more than 80 cultural Heritage Institutes in the DigiTraining Creative Europe project, to create representations for and on their own. This activity provided immensely valuable feedback in the optimisation of its User Interface. The Mingei Online Platform (MOP) implements a protocol for the advanced digitisation of Institutes Cultural Heritage and socio-historical context, through narratives and process schemas. 

Structure of capacity building programme

The programme is structured in 3 different levels; the General Programme will provide many organisations with a combined training on digital and audiovisual technology, as well as on digital-related management. The Specific Programme will provide up to 6 organisations with mentoring through a specific training programme resulting in a strongly increased capacity in digital skills as well as in strategy and management tools to deal with them. Finally, through the Qualified Programme a maximum of 3 selected organisations will benefit at no cost from the production of a virtual or augmented reality audiovisual project specifically adapted to their mission and narrative, together with the strategic and managerial advice to best integrate it in their activities.

Combining digital technology research, execution and training

DigiTraining’s consortium is composed by an experienced team from five different countries with complementary skills and competencies to respond to the urgent need for providing specific support to the cultural and creative heritage sector. This team merges tested expertise in digital technology research, execution and training; in direct support on management and innovation for start-ups and midsize organisations; in media, communication and audience development in the cultural sector; and in audio-visual & virtual reality production for the arts and cultural heritage.

Mingei Day

During the Mingei Day webinar on 10 March the the team of FORTH will give a demo of the Mingei Online Platform. Sign up for the webinar and join the discussion! For more contact about the Digitraining Project, please leave your contact details here.

Pattern design once was a well-respected vocation within the textile sector. The pattern designer or ‘dessinateur’ was the first craftsman involved in the production of splendid silk fabrics for, amongst other things, liturgical vestments. How did one become a pattern designer? And why has this once established vocation turned into oblivion?

The road towards pattern design

In the mid-19th century, the silk industry in and around Krefeld was made up of around 90 companies which required an increasing number of different skilled craftsmen. Therefore, both industry and small trades called for the establishment of a textile college, where the subjects appropriate to the production and processing of fabric, in particular silk, would be taught. As a result, the “Crefeld Höheren Webschule” (Krefeld Textile College) was set up in 1855. This was the only vocational college focussing on silk production in Germany and it soon gained a very good reputation. It was associated with a valuable textile collection right from the time it was established. Both the historical and the contemporary sample collections provided the basic requirements for design work and were a source of inspiration in particular for pattern designers.

This college, which was re-named “Textilingenieurschule” (Textile Engineering College) after the Second World War, provided the ideal opportunity for young men and women in Krefeld to learn an interesting and respected vocation, particularly if they had artistic talent and dexterity. This was indeed so in the case of Dieter Blatt and Günter Göbels, now active volunteers at Haus der Seidenkultur (HdS). As youngsters, both of them enjoyed drawing, were creative and were encouraged by their families to undertake the appropriate vocational training.[2] Today – over 50 years later – they are still happy to demonstrate their skills to visitors at Haus der Seidenkultur.

For the three important crafts required for Jacquard weaving, the basic curriculum took 3 years to complete and was very varied. The theoretical part alone included weave theory, material science, point paper design as well as life drawing, morphology and chromatics, composition and pattern design. The two HdS volunteers also explained that free-hand drawing, which was essential for design, was taught and practised during evening classes.

Having completed the basic training, the apprentices could choose one of the three specific crafts, namely pattern design, point paper design or Jacquard card punching. At the time in the mid-20th century, there was a clear differentiation between the three crafts. Once the apprentices had completed their training, some of them went on to work in independent technical workshops comprising 3 to 30 experts which served small silk production companies including weaving workshops for ecclesiastical textiles, whilst others were employed in technical workshops at the large textile factories in Krefeld and the surrounding area.

From established crafter to computer expert

The vocation of pattern designer was officially recognised on 4th November 1949. However, as a result of the increasing mechanisation and the re-structuring of vocational training in the textile sector, the vocation designation was abolished again on 1st August 1978. Nowadays the tasks of the pattern designer and point paper designer are all carried out by computer by one single expert, referred to as a “Textile Pattern and Product Designer”.

Pattern design was one of the most respected crafts in this sector. The pattern designer definitely needed to be creative and before starting on the design he had to carefully take into account many different aspects of the fabric to be produced – quality, final use, colour composition, pattern size and repeat.

Not only had he to consider historical patterns, former and modern art trends (e.g. Bauhaus), customer specifications but also to create his own abstract designs. He was responsible for determining the optical appearance of the fabric, had to be aware of the effect the choice of weave would have and take into account the chromaticity of the finished fabric. The number of colours used in the design depended to a large extent on the final product. For a print design, there was virtually no limit to the number of colours which could be used, but for a woven pattern the number of colours was determined by the actual production conditions. In the course of the 20th century, more and more synthetic colours and fabrics were introduced which needed to be handled differently to natural colours and fabrics.

In the case of Jacquard weaving, the pattern repeat is determined by the size of the loom harness. The maximum repeat width which the pattern designer has to take into account depends on the warp thread density per centimetre and the harness repeat.

Having considered all the above, the pattern designer went to work sketching the pattern as a picture which he then coloured according to the requirements of the finished fabric using brushes, paint and coloured crayons. For damask tablecloths which are white-in-white, the pattern design was produced in various tones of grey. The pattern designer also determined the weave to be used, as this gave the design its final character. Then he handed it over to the point paper designer for the next stage in the preparation prior to weaving.

Written by Cynthia Beisswenger and Andreas Deling (HdS)

References

In this series of short stories about a year in a mastic village, you will get to follow the journey of Dimitris and Giannis. Together with the young Dimitris, you are invited to observe and learn the master’s craft. This is the first chapter; stay tuned for more!

Α δε λαλήσει τζίτζικας εν είναι καλοκαίρι
If the harvest fly does not sing, it is not summer
(local saying of Chios island)

It is already late June, and Giannis decided to take young Dimitris on the mastic fields with him. Dimitris was waiting anxiously to help with the ‘kendima’, which means embroidering. He has grown up around mastic and wants to become a mastic grower. The fields of Giannis are near the village of Pyrgi, where they live. From the road, they can easily see those rather short trees with deep green leaves and with interesting trunks. On the southwestern part of Chios, mastic trees line the roads on both sides. The sun has started to come up, so Giannis and Dimitris must hurry if they want to finish their work before late noon. Otherwise the Greek sun will be unbearable.

“Dimitri, go find some branches and twigs to make a broom. We need to clean the soil under the trees,” Giannis said. “Ok, I’m going. Don’t start the ‘table’ without me,” Dimitrits replied and he started running immediately to look for branches. “You don’t have to run!” Giannis shouted after him. “Have some patience. I will wait for you.”

While waiting for Dimitris, Giannis looked at one of the older mastic trees. Its branches had grown so much that you could almost stand completely under it. When he was a child, he used to think that the trees were already very big, because he himself was small. While growing up, he learned that mastic trees are actually rather short trees, and it takes specific cultivation methods to make them bigger.

His grandmother used to tell him many stories about life in the past. How back then, they used to bring their children along at the field because there was no one else to babysit at home. Their main transport were donkeys and their saddles were used as baby beds. After taking off the saddle from the donkey, the women would turn it over and place a jute bag in it. Using a rope, they would then hang the saddle-baby bed from a strong mastic tree branch and leave the baby to sleep as if in a swinging bed.

“Hey Giannis, wake up!” Dimitris called him out of his daydream. “What happened?” Giannis asked. “Come on! Let’s clean and level the soil and lay down the white soil!” Dimitris answered full of excitement. “Okay, okay.. I wish I had that enthusiasm when I was your age,” Giannis laughed. Together, they carefully cleaned the soil with the broom they made, called ‘athrimba’.

“I will show you today how to make the first incisions on the tree,” Giannis said. “Today, Kendima? But isn’t it too early? June has not even finished,” said Dimitris confused. “No, it is not too early,” Giannis explained. “We always do the first incisions right after cleaning the soil, in order to ‘wake up’  the tree and start producing mastic. But be careful, we will only make some very few incisions on the bottom of the trunk of each tree. Do you want to know how we call this first kendima?” Giannis asked. “Sure!” Dimitris was excited to learn. “It is called riniasma,” Giannis told him.

Now they were ready to start. “Which tool are you going to use?” Giannis asked. Dimitris looked at the tools in front of them. “The kenditiri or baltadaki,” he answered. “Well done, you have learned all of them!” said Giannis enthusiastically. “Now let’s get to work.”

This is a fictional story written by Danae Kaplanidi (PIOP), and is the outcome of archival and ethnographic fieldwork research in the villages of Mesta, Olimpi, Emporeios and Pyrgi. The author would like to thank the research participants for their time and willingness to share stories about life in southern Chios.
Top image: Mastic field of the Chios Mastic Museum, 2019. Photo: Danae Kaplanidi

Limerick Lace is an active community of local lace makers, the Limerick Museum and Archives and local educational institutions in Ireland. The community is an intriguing example of how traditional crafts are kept alive and relevant. Waag’s Dick van Dijk  spoke to Gabriela Avram, lace making enthusiast and lecturer in Digital Media and Interaction Design in the Department of Computer Science and Information Systems of the university of Limerick. What can we learn from the Limerick Lace project?

Lace making

Limerick lace is a hybrid lace made on a machine made net base. It is a ‘mixed lace’ rather than a ‘true lace’, which would be entirely hand made. Though Ireland has around 7 or 8 types of lace, Limerick lace is the most famous of all Irish laces. It has been worn by thousands of women, including Queen Victoria, American First Lady Edith Roosevelt and Countess Markievicz.

Limerick lace comes in two forms:
• tambour lace, that is made by stretching a net over a frame like a tambourine and drawing threads through it with a hook;
• needlerun lace, which is made by using a needle to embroider on a net background.

As the holes of the net (called gaskets) on which you create the pattern are very small, making lace is not only about carefully looking, but it relies on muscle mind and practice as well. There are 47 distinct stitches in Limerick Lace. The first steps of lace making are explained here.

Made in Limerick

The recent revival of lace making started in 2014 when Limerick was cultural capital of Ireland and several ‘Made in Limerick’ projects were funded by the Irish government, Limerick Lace being one of them. Its main objectives were to design and create an exhibition of Limerick Lace for the Limerick Museum, and to produce a book on the history of Limerick Lace.

The Limerick Museum and Archives host a valuable collection of local lace, partly ecclesiastic, partly domestic (dollies, aprons, christening robes). But before 2014, there were only two cabinets in the museum displaying lace.

One of the locals who got involved in the Limerick Lace project is Gabriela Avram. She joined the project out of personal interest in civic engagement and the potential link with modern technologies, such as augmenting lace with digital technology and creating digital tools to support lace makers.

Gabriela Avram was commissioned to build an interactive installation for the 2014 exhibition, Amazing Lace. Together with interaction design master student Suzanna Melinn and the local community they co-designed the installation Enlaced, consisting of an artificial leather laser cut front dress on a mannequin, augmented with lace pieces contributed by various local community members mounted on the sleeves, including NFC tags allowing the visitors to identify each maker.

Additionally, the exhibition presented instructions for visitors on how to make lace and try lace making out themselves. Later on, a Limerick Lace starter kit was constructed and made available through Etsy. It is hard for novices to get access to the materials needed, so the kit is an important step in making the craft more accessible.

Friends of Lace

In the years that followed, the activities to revive the lace community continued. The Limerick Lace project encouraged locals to bring out their own lace pieces to show and discuss, in a series of events titled Bring Out Your Lace. In the local Fablab, several local artists and makers started experimenting with lace making through other means than textiles, such as paper, 3D printers and laser cutters.

In 2016, Limerick Museum and Archives, in collaboration with the Limerick School of Art and Design organised a festival titled Hybrid: the identity of liminal lace, addressing the role of lace and its social-economic history. The festival included several exhibitions and lace-making workshops, as well as a conference.

The Florence Vere O’Brien lace drawing competition, initiated in 2015, invited art students to come up with new designs for Limerick lace, and the submissions went beyond any expectations, encouraging a potential move away from the dominant, traditional motives of flowers towards streetscapes and everyday objects.

A local group of lace enthusiasts formed in 2017 and became known as the Friends of Lace. They became more structurally involved to help to conserve and preserve artefacts, for example by repacking the lace in storage at the Museum following strict conservation rules, catalogue lace items, create teaching resources and support novel interpretations and uses of Limerick lace.
The revival made them visible as an active community group, which led to other groups following their example. In July 2019, Limerick lace was added to the National Inventory of Intangible Heritage.

Embracing new possibilities

Gabriela sees her role as attempting to bridge a gap between a valued traditional craft, and the opportunities offered by modern digital technologies for its preservation, documentation, further development and outreach.

One of Gabriela’s findings in liaising with art students is that new audiences lack dexterity, they don’t know how to use the needle – as they are mostly used to keyboard and mouse. In learning the craft trying things out is necessary, including the nuisance of undoing what you have already created, and starting over.

By now, the community’s activities also target tourism, through information leaflets in hotels, workshops for tourists, which especially receive high interest from American tourists. Apart from their own website and social media channels, the Friends of Lace are working towards an all Irish laces website, dreaming of a Limerick lace study centre (modelled after the one in Sydney) and potentially a free online lace images repository, created and edited by volunteers around the world.

Gabriela Avram is Lecturer in Digital Media and Interaction Design in the Department of Computer Science and Information Systems of the University of Limerick, Ireland, and a senior member of the Interaction Design Centre. Her current research focuses on sustainable urban development, collaborative economy and the role of technology in supporting civic engagement of local communities.

Written by Dick van Dijk from Waag

References

Have you ever wondered how the pattern in splendid silk fabrics is created? Or asked yourself how many steps are involved in the process? The answer is Jacquard weaving. But what does that entail exactly? Haus der Seidenkultur takes us along the journey of Jacquard.

The original draw loom

The story behind Jacquard weaving dates back to China in the second century B.C., when the first draw loom was invented for silk weaving. In order to weave an intricate silk pattern or picture, it is necessary to raise or lower each of the sometimes thousands of warp threads individually to form a shed through which to pass the shuttle.

At that time, this was done by a so-called draw-boy who sat on top of the loom. Every single row of weaving required different warp threads to be raised or lowered and consequently the production process was very slow and required meticulous attention. This was the main reason why over a period of three-quarters of a century several inventors turned their minds to constructing a better system.

Basile Bouchon improved the traditional draw loom in 1725, when he substituted an endless band of perforated paper for the bunches of looped strings previously used. In 1728, Jean-Baptiste Falcon used perforated cards manipulated by a draw boy. Jacques de Vaucanson combined these two inventions in 1745, placing his machine where the pulley box had previously been. Finally, the breakthrough came from Joseph Marie Jacquard who took these inventions one step further to speed up the process and remove the need for a weaver’s assistant.

Developing Jacquard weaving

Joseph Marie Jacquard was born into a master weaver’s family in Lyon France in 1752. He spent most of his time helping in his father’s workshop gaining experience in the various facets of weaving rather than going to school. Some say that he actually worked as a draw boy. After the death of his father in 1772, Jacquard half-heartedly took over his business. However, he must have started his late career in silk loom-making around 1799.

Jacquard’s dream was to build a revolutionary new machine for weaving pictures into silk brocade. He had an innate talent as a craftsman and inventor, carving the pulleys and other components himself. Other master craftsmen and businessmen obviously had faith in him because he was offered financial support to keep working on his machine until it was perfected. He finally took out a first patent in December 1800, which is registered in the archives in Lyons for a “machine designed to replace the draw boy in the manufacture of figured fabrics”. The patent for his brocade loom, with which he is most known for, was finally granted in 1804.

The draw-boy is replaced

On Jacquard’s loom, the weaver controlled the pattern with the help of a punched card system. Each punched card was pressed once against the back of an array of small, narrow, circular metal rods. Each rod controls the action of a weighted string that in turn controls one individual warp thread. If the rod encountered solid cardboard, the rod would not move and the warp thread stayed where it was. If the rod went through a hole then the warp thread would be raised to form part of the shed. The pattern or picture was embodied in an endless string of cards which were advanced one at a time by the weaver depressing the treadle of the loom.

Fabulous ornate silk fabrics could now be woven much faster. Napoleon and his wife visited Jacquard’s workshop in 1805, having previously decreed that his ceremonial garments be woven by the silk weavers in Lyon; no doubt on a Jacquard loom. He also declared that Jacquard’s loom should be public property, in return for which Jacquard received a handsome pension. Jacquard looms soon spread around Europe, including to Krefeld in Germany.

Moreover, Jacquard’s invention has influenced industries beyond crafts. The use of replaceable punched cards to control repetitive operations is considered important for the development of computer hardware. Jacquard’s idea of punched cards to control a machine was taken up by Babbage and Ada Lovelace and incorporated in his “Victorian” computer.

At Haus der Seidenkultur in Krefeld, Jacquard looms originally dating from 1868, just 30 years after Jacquard’s death, can still be seen in action in the original workplace. Experts are still demonstrating the preliminary skills required to prepare the harness for a Jacquard loom and transfer an ornate picture to fabric via point paper and punched cards. The Mingei project aims to preserve and represent the knowledge and skill of these crafters.

Written by Cynthia Beisswenger of Haus der Seidenkultur

Sources:

Encyclopaedia Britannica Ltd., London, Copyright 1957
Jacquard’s Web, James Essinger, Published by Oxford University Press, First Paperback edition 2007

One of Mingei’s pilot studies involves mastic; a product from the mastic tree which exclusively grows in the south-west of Chios in Greece. The craft is highly localized, and the cultivation of mastic has historically shaped the local life. The 24 villages from where mastíha is harvested are known as Mastihochoria, or Mastic Villages – their name being an indication of the importance of mastic for the region. In order to explore and illustrate how the craft practice of mastic and its community have shaped the urban context, we created 3D reconstructions of the villages. How does the practice of crafts shape its surroundings and the local life?

The Island of Chios

The Island of Chios is situated opposite of the large natural bay of Smyrna, Asia Minor on the seaway from the exit of Dardanelles to the island of Rhodes or Alexandria. In 1571, the island passed from the Genoese under the rule of Ottoman domination. Both until 16th and the beginning of the 20th century, many visitors and navigators stayed on the island and passed down important texts and pictorial material over many generations. On the one hand, the rare product mastic, which can only be extracted from a common kind of a tree called “Skinos” on southern Chios. And on the other hand, the beauty and courtesy of women as well as their lavish costumes inspired foreign visitors to describe and represent the Island’s uniqueness.

At the beginning of the 15th century, Chios Island is mapped in “Liber Insularum Archipelagi” by Cr. Buondelmonti, which became a standard for the later maps of islands, such as those of B. Dalli Sonetti (1485) and B. Bordone (1547).

Nowadays, Chios is one of the largest islands in the Aegean Sea and is famous for the mild climate, the beautiful beaches and the variety of historical monuments. First and foremost, Chios has been well known throughout the world for the cultivation of mastic trees since ancient times. Mastic (μαστίχα) is a natural product collected from the bark of mastic trees, which exclusively flourish in the southern part of the island and due to this fact, the medieval settlements in that area are called “Mastichochoria”, as from mastic villages (χωριά).

The development of mastic villages

These settlements date back to the Byzantine Era and they are still Cultural Heritage monuments, although they have suffered disasters over the centuries. During the Genoese occupation (1346–1566), the mastic cultivation becomes progressively systematic and 22 mastic villages are founded in the southern part of the island aiming mainly at exploiting mastic, as a monopolistic product. Τhe geographical position of the villages was not visible from the sea and their layout reminds of a fortress, of which the aim was to protect the inhabitants from the frequent incursions in the Aegean Sea.

Latin architects, engineers and contractors oppressively had local farmers build the villages, according to the Italian architectural model of that era. In the center of each settlement, there was a tall rectangular tower, around of which there were houses very close to each other. The walls of the houses located circumferentially of the village formed an external wall with a cylindrical turret with crenellations on each corner to avoid invaders who tried to approach the center of the village by confusing them. This architectural draft gave masters the opportunity to close the gates in order for protection.

The houses of Mastic Villages follow the same architecture. They are stone-built, consisting of ground and first floor and are covered by semicircular domes called “Germata”. On the ground floor were stables and a storage room for agricultural products. On the first floor were the other rooms, which spread around a central outdoor space, the “Poundi”, which served to illuminate and ventilate the floor. The roofs of all the houses were about the same height, making it easy for residents to escape from the top of them in case of threat.

Τhe best preserved Mastic Villages are those that did not suffer major damage in the disastrous earthquake of 1881: Pyrgi, Mesta, Olympoi and less Vessa, Kalamoti and Elata.

To illustrate craft practice and community needs shaped the urban context we used aerial images of the Pyrgi, Mesta, Olympoi and Elata villages to show the densely-constructed houses which formed continuous external walls and the location of maximum security: the central tower in the village where mastic was stored and guarded during day and night. The 3D reconstructions of these villages are shown to illustrate and understand these architectural structures. It ought to be noted, that in later years, the towers in Mesta and Elata were replaced by churches. The location of the central tower for our four villages and the wall perimeter is shown. Can you find them in the 3D reconstructions?

Pyrgi Village

Pyrgi is a rich village for its folklore, archaeological and linguistic importance. The village is surrounded by a medieval fence that is formed by the external walls of the houses. There were only two exits from the village, which used to be sealed with two iron gates. The roads are narrow and the two or three storey houses are tall. The name of the village comes from the tall tower around of which the rest settlement was built. The Byzantine temple of Holy Apostles, with the well-preserved frescoes inspired from the Old and the New Testament, is situated at the village square. The existence of this church proves that the village was not constructed by Genoese for the first time, but several nearby settlements merged with the existing village during the Genoese occupation.

In Pyrgi the façades of the buildings have been decorated in a different and unique way throughout Greece. More precisely, this technique is based on the black sand of the roughcast, which is painted with white color and then it is scratched diligently. In that way, a variety of black patterns can be created on a white background, such as triangles, circles, semicircles, or rhombus. This technique is called “Xysta” and many walls of houses and churches have been decorated in this manner, giving an outstanding impression to the village. At last Pyrgi is a village of folklore interest and the only one of several villages that maintains many customs and traditions till today.

Mesta Village

Mesta is the most typical sample of fortification and the most well-preserved of the rest mastic villages, in the south of Chios. The village was built in a pentagonal form, which is perhaps unique in Greece, during the Byzantine Era, while later Genoases improved its fortification. Each house is built next to the other, without gaps but only two entrances to the interior of the village. The alleys are narrow and most of them are covered with arches, on which some residences are built. The layout of the village reminds of a labyrinth, aiming at preventing pirates from easily approaching the center of it.

The oldest monument of Mesta is the church of Old Taxiarches. It is a single-aisled Basilica, built during the Byzantine period. In the interior of which there are traces of frescoes, although most have been destroyed. The largest church in the village is the newest church of Taxiarches, built in 1868 on the site of the old circular castle tower. Next to it, there is the central, traditional village square with taverns and cafes. Nowadays, Mesta is a major attraction for many tourists, both for its unique architecture and the natural beauty of the area. The main occupation of the inhabitants is agriculture.

Olympoi Village

Olympoi Village lies in a small, treeless valley far from the sea. It is a medieval village of the 14^th century and has been declared a listed monument. The village maintains the form of the medieval “castle-village” quite well, enclosed by the exterior walls of the houses, which joined together. Those residences had no doors or windows, so as to deter their owners from seeing the outside of the village. The stone-paved streets of the village are narrow and lead to the main square. The functional character of the houses supports the village’s defense against pirate raids. The church of St. Paraskevi with its wood-carved iconostasis and the Trapeza of Olympoi, a two-storey building with long hallways preserved in a good condition since the Middle Ages, are of noteworthy interest. Just outside the village, near the beach of St. Dinami with the homonymous church, there is a cavern with remarkable natural decoration of stalactites. It was first visited in 2000.

Elata Village

Elata Village is located in a semi-mountain area, on a rocky hill in the southern part of the village where three windmills were built and are preserved to date. The position of the village is away from the sea, although there is a clear view of the Aegean Sea. The position and the architecture of Elata illustrate the dread of the inhabitants due to the frequent raids of the pirates from the Middle Ages till the Turkish Occupation. The “village-castle” architecture of Elata is still preserved to a certain extent. Seven older Byzantine settlements united to build the castle of Elata, probably around 1300 AD. At that time, the inhabitants of the village were engaged in the farming of a wild bird called partridge, which is not the case nowadays. The name of the village is thought to come from the Greek phrase “elate, elate” (=come, come) which was shouted at the inhabitants of the surrounding settlements to enter the castle when they were informed about the arrival of pirate ships.

To sum up, Chios island is a destination that invites visitors to discover it. Apart from beautiful beaches with clear waters, Chios stands out for the medieval villages in the southern part of the island, which are famous throughout the world for the production of mastic. This natural product is cultivated entirely by hand and is nowadays used in medicine, pharmacy, dentistry and cosmetics. Mastic villages also display exquisite architecture and unique decorative elements on the facades of the houses, offering visitors the opportunity to travel back in time.

Want to learn more about the mastic villages? Go visit The Chios Mastic Museum! The museum is situated in the wider area of Pyrgi Village and aims at presenting the history of mastic cultivation and the processing of its resin, which integrates into the cultural landscape of Chios. The permanent exhibition of the museum lies emphasis on the mastic as a unique natural product. The first module presents the traditional know-how of mastic cultivation. The second module focuses on how managing the cultivation and its produce shaped the agricultural landscape and the settlements of southern Chios and the Mastic Villages historically. The third module is dedicated to mastic resin’s cooperative exploitation and processing in modern times, which marks an important chapter in the productive history of Chios. The museum guidance is completed with an outdoor experience, since the public comes into contact with the mastic trees and the natural habitat, where they prosper.

Written by Argyro, Polykarpos and Xenophon from FORTH, photography and video by Thodoris Evdaimon (FORTH)