95 articles
Anni Albers
Anni Albers, born Annelise Fleischmann in Berlin in 1899, was a German-born American textile artist and educator who helped establish textiles as modern art.
Backstrap loom
A backstrap loom, in Spanish telar de cintura, is a portable frameless loom in which the weaver supplies tension by leaning against a waist strap. Used in the Americas for over 4,000 years.
Baleen basketry
Baleen basketry: coiled baskets woven from whale baleen (keratin) with carved walrus ivory finials, developed by Iñupiaq artisans in North Alaska after 1914 and now a collectible Alaska Native art form.
Banarasi brocade
Banarasi brocade is a zari-ornamented silk fabric woven in Varanasi, Uttar Pradesh, whose motifs are built into the cloth on the loom; the name has been Geographically Indication protected since 2009.
Banarasi saree
The Banarasi saree is a silk sari woven in Varanasi, India, known for its brocade patterns with zari and shaped under Mughal patronage in the 16th century.
Banig
Banig is the Filipino handwoven sleeping or sitting mat, made from tikog, pandan, buri, or rattan; regional traditions include Tawi-Tawi's Badjao and Samal mats, the Maranao round mat, and Basey, Samar, the banig capital.
Basket
Basket: a container woven from plant materials such as wicker, cane, bamboo, straw, roots, or splints using coiling, twining, or plaiting; used for carrying, storage, and cultural expression worldwide.
Basket weaving
Basket weaving is the hand interlacing of plant materials such as reeds, grasses, bark, and roots into containers, mats, and other objects, using three basic techniques: coiling, twining, and plaiting.
Basketry in museum collections
Basketry in museum collections is the collecting, cataloging, display, and conservation of woven plant-fiber baskets, which serve as art, ethnographic record, and ancestral belongings for source communities.
Basketry Museum of the Roma
Basketry Museum of the Roma (Μουσείο Καλαθοπλεκτικής των Ρωμά), founded 1995 in Komotini and moved to Thrylorio in 2004, is an ethnological-technological museum of Roma basket-weaving with over 300 baskets from Thrace, the Balkans, and worldwide.
Berber carpets
Berber carpets are handwoven rugs made by Amazigh (Berber) women of the Atlas Mountains of Morocco and Algeria, with geometric motifs carrying symbolic meanings in Amazigh culture.
Bhutanese textiles
Bhutanese textiles are the handwoven fabrics of Bhutan, above all the gho and kira national dress, forming one of the most developed weaving traditions in the Himalayas.
Bobbin
Bobbin, also called pirn or quill, is a cylindrical or tapered spool holding yarn or thread in spinning, weaving, and sewing. Covers industrial types and materials, shuttle use, bobbin batteries, winders, and 1-2 year service life.
Braid
Braid: a narrow textile structure made by diagonally interlacing three or more strands of thread, wire, or fiber. One thread system unlike weaving; used for ropes, kumihimo cords, and composite reinforcement.
Brocade
Brocade (Italian broccato, 'embossed cloth') is a richly decorative fabric woven with supplementary, non-structural wefts, often silk with gold or silver thread; continuous or discontinuous, on draw or jacquard looms.
Chanderi sari
The Chanderi saree is a sheer, lightweight handwoven saree from Chanderi, Madhya Pradesh, India, woven with silk warp, cotton weft, and gold or silver zari.
Chendamangalam handloom weavers
Chendamangalam handloom weavers of Ernakulam district, Kerala, a Devanga Chettiar community settled under the Paliam chief ministers, weave GI-tagged kasavu set mundu, dhotis, and sarees with the puliyilakara border on fully manual looms.
Chief's blanket
A chief's blanket is a finely woven wearing blanket made by Diné (Navajo) weavers of the Southwestern United States, woven wider than long and worn wrapped around the shoulders.
Chilkat blanket
The Chilkat blanket (Tlingit naaxein, "fringe about the body") is a ceremonial textile woven by hand from mountain goat wool and cedar bark by Pacific Northwest Coast peoples.
Chilkat weaving
Chilkat weaving is a finger-twined textile art of the northern Northwest Coast, in which Tlingit and Haida weavers make ceremonial robes from mountain goat wool and cedar bark.
Chiprovtsi carpet
The Chiprovtsi carpet (Чипровски килим), also called Chiprovtsi kilim, is a handwoven, geometric, double-sided Bulgarian rug made in Chiprovtsi, northwestern Bulgaria, inscribed on UNESCO's intangible heritage list in 2014.
Coast Salish weaving
Coast Salish weaving is the textile tradition of the Coast Salish peoples of Washington and British Columbia, producing wool blankets used as wealth and regalia.
Cumbi
Cumbi, also spelled qompi or gompi, was the finest cloth of the Inca Empire, a double-faced tapestry weave of camelid fiber and cotton reserved for the ruler and nobility.
Distaff
Distaff: a stick or board holding raw flax, hemp, or wool for spinning with a spindle or wheel; also called rock or Fingerkunkel. Symbol of women's work, source of "distaff side" and St Distaff's Day.
Donegal tweed
Donegal tweed is a woollen cloth from County Donegal, Ireland, known for colourful flecks (neps), herringbone and pepper-and-salt weaves, and a hand-weaving tradition; unlike Harris tweed it lacks statutory protection, and a PGI bid is underway.
Ewe kente
Ewe kente, also called kete or agbamevor, is strip-woven cloth made by the Ewe people of Ghana and Togo, distinguished from Asante kente by its figurative motifs of animals, people, and letters.
Friendship bracelet
Friendship bracelet: handmade knotted or beaded token of friendship, a macramé-style craft. Made from cotton embroidery floss, rooted in Central American weaving, revived by Taylor Swift's Eras Tour.
Gunta Stölzl
Gunta Stölzl (Adelgunde Stölzl, 1897–1983), German weaver and textile designer; the only female Bauhaus master, she led the Dessau weaving workshop 1927–1931, made it the school's top earner, then ran hand-weaving businesses in Zurich.
Hakata-ori
Hakata-ori is a thick, tightly woven silk fabric from Fukuoka City, Japan, used chiefly for kimono obi sashes and known for the striped kenjo pattern; it dates to 1241.
Handloom sari
Handloom sari: a sari woven on a manually operated loom, legally "any loom other than powerloom" in India. Also called handwoven saree; distinguished from powerloom copies by weave variation and certification marks; 35.22 lakh weavers per the 2019-20 census.