 |
Close up of a finished Shibori Silk Scarf
Of all the threads I love to use, the best, beyond a doubt, is silk. Cotton can get pretty good, but nothing is even remotely as easy and luxurious to use as silk thread! Yum! Silk production is older than anything I can think of--estimates put it between 7000 BC and 3000 BC. It was at first only used to adorn the royalty of China, where it's cultivation began. It soon popped up on musical instruments, fishing lines, paper and a very strong flexible glue. For a time it even became the sole means of currency in China--imagine being paid in silk each week?
|
By 330 AD silk had traveled to the western world, and the rest is, actually, history. Silk owes it's high price to the lengthy process used to create it, which is actually a little, Ew, Ick. But we are adults and we love our silk, so: the little silkworm spins it's silken cocoon around itself, ready to make it's change. Silk makers then gather thousands and thousand of these cocoons and boil them. The boiling process allows the threads of the cocoon to be slowly unwound, pulled out of the vat and wound onto a spool. Alas the poor little silk worm is sacrificed, but his legacy is a strong one. The fine gauzy spooled thread it is dyed and then woven into fabric or spun to make the threads we needlepointers love so well!
Silk is an entire subculture unto itself, be it scarves or ties, sheets or ribbon, silk is the quintessential definition of luxury. The silk scarf is a complete art form unto itself, examples range from the kitschy modern handpainted scarves on
Etsy to the revered and high end
Pucci,
Givenchy and
Bvlgari.
 |
A silk scarf by Pucci
and then, of course, one of my favorites, Hermes.
I love the colors in these scarves, and I love silk!
Old Japanese Silk Store
|
 |
| a favorite of mine, Planet Earth Silks |
