Textiles is in my background. My great aunt was considered the “mother of American weaving”, having written a book on the disappearing weaving patterns of the America North East. Another great aunt had one of her old looms in the attic. I used to play with it as a child, trying to figure out how it fit together. My mother sewed constantly on an old converted treadle machine she inherited from her mother. I grew up going to fabric stores. I own her machine now.
In college, I learned to spin yarn. For a long time I didn’t even know how to knit, I just loved the process, the simple old tools and the connection to the women in my family. I ran a textiles studio, teaching people to weave and spin and dye using horrible noxious chemical dyes. The colors were garish, but could be tempered by mixing with their complimentary and secondary colors to make muddy approximations of earth colors. Finally I discovered natural dyes, starting first from foodstuffs available in my refrigerator, then moving on to traditional dye materials. The colors were lovely and real. All of the colors seem to work together. Natural dye colors have a much longer life than chemical colors. Weavers in many parts of the world are returning to natural dyes both because the colors are much more fade resistant, and because the dyestuff usually grows local.
Recently I read a piece in a magazine that sad that because clothes are so cheap and disposable now, today’s youth grow up not even knowing how to sew on a button. Could that be the disappearing craft of my generation?