Weaving in universal while outcome is local. What we have in the end differs from one another because it is affected from the environment, people, climate, geographical factors, history and so on.
In weaving, weavers and fabric designers get inspirations from their surroundings for example motifs, stripes, shapes used in architecture and existed in nature, animal itself or the alphabet they use.
The materials in the weaving process are also hidden in the nature. Wool, mohair, alpaca, cotton which is taken from higlands and animals is used as the main need. And if color is needed, flowers and plants are used during dying the thread. And handloom is made of wool -meaning trees.
While each material has already a long process and is handled by a group of people, imagine to use it with other components to get dressed or decorate your house.
The other universal thing in this context is nature which changes in each continent, state, country, city.
These two notions -weaving and nature- have a big impact on each other. Weaving occurs with what nature has, and nature is the reason why the weaving started thousands of years ago in the beginning: to survive in the cold weather.
With that in mind, over the years, weaving has undergone a big change with mass industrial production. But this change is another post's issue for now. Let's put this change aside and talk what is done with traditional weaving style in today's world?
A couple days ago, we had the opportunity to visit the People's Art: From Our Traditons to Our Future exhibition in Atatürk Kültür Merkezi in Taksim Square/ Istanbul. In the exhibition, we saw a collection made out of traditional fabrics and methods. Each cloth was made of different textile that reflects a city in Türkiye. Ehram from Erzurum, silk weaving from Bursa, beledi weaving from İzmir and the other 29 fabrics from various cities of Türkiye.
From Our Traditions to Our Future collection was designed by Turkish designer Dilek Hanif who has its own brand and inspired from Ottoman and Turkish culture. With this culture perspective, she has been designing elegant and contemporary ready-to-wear and haute couture since 1990.
See how Turkish culture contains magnificent craftsmanship and turns it out into a contemporary art with design through clothing:
This is how felt for clothing is used. We really love this colorful coat. Felt on clothes is a really good material especially for the winter season.
The exhibition was the reflection of Turkish culture clothing which is a mixture of past, now and future. Cultural heritage of Turkey is full of stories with different heroes, places, time frames. Our blog will provide you the information about Turkey culture and traditions.
As we specificially focus on Black Sea Region, you will read more about Turkey Black Sea Culture but Turkey culture will be our second main topic.
Thank you for your time.