Day 5 Naha Okinawa. This is glorious cloth woven by Michiko Uehara an artist/weaver who has exhibited in New York as well as in Japan. She reels the silk threads off the cocoons herself and weaves the most sheer cloth I’ve ever seen. This piece is double woven as a tube.
Another silk woven by Michiko Uehara. She dropped it from the sir and it simply floated down. She showed us maybe 20 large pieces–each one more thrilling than the last.
One piece was woven both warp and weft with threads that came from single cocoons. Always several if not 10 or so are reeled off at once to form fine threads. I held the cloth and was amazed that is was light as a feather. What you see here are the warp threads. If you look closely you can glimpse the cloth.
One of Michiko’s daughters is a potter and made these tiny containers for the tea in the tea ceremony. These are what I’ve been so interested in. Michiko herself wove her fine silks for the bags for the containers made by a contemporary potter in a joint exhibition.
We also went to Haebaru Village to see kasuri cloth being tied, dyed, and woven. Here a man is painting the lines on the threads instead of tying and then dyeing them.
Here two sets of fine warp threads are being put into the reed.
These are warp threads that have been starched before weaving. The warp looked like straw.
Thank you for sharing with us
Your blog has opened my mind to a different aspect of weaving. Enjoy your trip! And thanks for the education.
As a beginning weaver the thought of using such fine warp and weft threads makes my head spin. It is a beautiful goal to stretch for. Thank you so much for the photos from your trips. They are very inspiring
The delicacy and beauty take my breath away. Thanks for sharing the intricacies I would never know about otherwise.
Thanks you, Peggy, for sharing your marvelous Okinawan adventures. Very inspiring that these contemporary textile artists are preserving the finest in weaving traditions.
Thanks Peggy,
I am enjoying your trip from my recliner.