Cloth Baby Cradle

This is one of the most poignant embroidery pieces for me. When we purchased it in India it had only been a short time before that we were told it wasn't safe for me to get pregnant. At the time I was wavering between being okay with that situation and being depressed about it. Then four years later I had a beauitful baby girl with the help of new advances in medicines. The cradle has graced a wall in her bedroom ever since.

I do often wonder at the circumstances that led to the selling of this beautiful cradle. There was obviously a lot of loving work put into it. During my pregnancy I worked diligently on a knitted baby sweater that will never leave my possession if I have that choice. It is almost as though all my hopes and fears for my baby were tangled in it along with the yarn. Perhaps there is a kind of magic that goes into the making of these so-important objects. So I look at this piece and wonder why this mother had to give up this cradle and I think about the fact that it is now my responsiblity to keep it safe and allow it's beauty to be appreciated.

The border is created with lines of Square chain stitch which enclose sections of cretan stitched diamonds and a couched lattice of bright pink and light green. The hem is a blue cotton band machine-stitched over the edges, a popular finishing treatment for the decorative textiles that we have from this region. On the inside border is a zigzag of open chain stitch in blue with what appear to be neem leaves in cretan stitch pointing inward. One of the neat features of the border is that the diamonds and leaves are done in pairs of colors which really creates a striking design.

Elaborate flowers decorate the inner portion with tiny mirrors forming their bases. The flowers and all their parts are done completely with cretan stitch in bright, cheerful colors. It is charming that in some areas the flowers are extremely close together while in others they are carefully spaced (reminds me of some of my less successfull knitting stitches on the baby sweater mentioned earlier!). On the close up above several areas can be seen which are damaged, with missing stitches and some discoloration of the ground cloth.

The cradle is fully lined with what appears to be a muslin back which the embroidery is also stitched through.

To use this type of cradle, a wooden frame forms the main support. This frame would have a long center pole from which the cradle is suspended. At each end a pair of legs would form an 'A' shape from the center pole to the ground. Here is a picture of one of the cradles when it is not in use. (Please forgive the horrible picture quality for I was a terrifyingly bad photographer back then.)

Rabari Skirt Border

This beautifully embroidered ghaghara border we found in a small Rabari village just north of Bhuj, Gujarat. It is a common practice to find other uses for the time-consuming embroidery when the rest of the garment has become unusable for one reason or another. In this case I do not know anything about the rest of the garment other than the fact of it being one of the heavy, gathered skirts that are generally reserved for brides. Whether this border was once embroidered onto a contiguous piece of cloth or sewn onto an existing garment, I do not know.

The ground fabric for the artful embroidery is black cotton and the embroidery threads are also cotton. Square and triangular mirrors abound in the motifs which are Kachhi Rabari designs.

At the top of the border are curving designs done in square chain stitch, called ambo, which is one type of mango tree motif. In the above picture some fading of the threads can be seen in the blue stitches on the left. The interior of the diamonds that make up the center of the ambo design are filled with a loose herringbone stitch.

Triangular mirrors form the bottom of the mango tree design. The stitching used to hold these mirrors in place on the fabric is very intricate with the stitches stretching out to the orange chain stitch in long lines at the bottom corners while being forced into tiny spaces along the lenth of the triangle borders. Below is a close-up of the small designs between each of the ambo. A diamond of small chain stitches above a very tightly woven example of interlaced stitching.Next comes a border of the popti (parrot-like) design. The yellow square chain stitches are contiguous lines that are embroidered over the tops of one another when they meet. An elongated chain stitch is used for the center fill.

In this shot of the back of the embroidery can be seen the jumbled maze created by the stitches on the inside fabric. It is easy to detect the different designs despite the messiness.Underneath the line of popti is a very intricate border, bavaliyo - thorny acacia, in between two lines of white square chain makoliyo borders. The bavaliyo is perhaps one of my favorite Rabari embroidery designs because I love the mixture of stitches. A square mirror, a line of herringbone stitching, an interlace stitch square, another line of herringbone stitching and so on, all encased in the ever-present square chain borders. In this example the mirror is sewn on by two different color threads which is intriguing. Did the embroiderer run out of the original color or just get bored with one color? Another popti line completes the border just above the bright red bias tape hem.

While the hem is machine sewn to the fabric on the front with a contrasting white thread, it is hand finished on the back with a bright green thread.

Judy Frater's book "Threads of Identity" was of invaluable help as reference for the stitches used, names and meanings of the embroidery motifs.

Yao Women's Pants

We visited a small Iu Mien Yao village in Thailand on the road from Doi Tung to Doi Mae Salong. The ladies that we met were delightful, including an elderly grannie who is probably the toughest person that I have ever met. As we purchased the trousers from her there was a long period of negotiation and bargaining in which she produced the most incredible scowls when we offered too low a price. Once the price was settled upon she came back to her normal smiling self and there were no hard feelings, it was all part of the 'game' of the bargain. I will do another post on her entire costume at a later date. She is the one that embroidered the trousers above and informed us during the bargaining process that it took her 6 months to finish them.

Yao costume varies quite a bit depending on sub-branches, groups and 'nationality' but the beautifully embroidered pants are common to almost all Yao. "All Yao Mien and Mun women wear trousers except for one Mien sub-branch, the Yao Tien from Northern Vietnam, and one Mun sub group in Hainan, China."pg. 102 of ' The Yao Mien and Mun of ...' by Jess G. Pourrett

The loose trousers remind me a bit of the way that some Middle Eastern pants are constructed with the large triangular crotch piece. The cloth is indigo-dyed cotton and the embroidery threads are also cotton. The leg panels are embroidered first, then sewn to the rest of the pants with a loose running stitch. Typical of Thai Iu Mien Yao trousers this pair has the mandatory weave stitch pattern at the bottom of the legs and then three large panels of designs going up almost to the waist.

Here you can see the stitching on the inside seams.

Amazingly the embroidery is done from the back of the fabric, a common theme in South Asian tribal embroidery. The bottoms of the legs are embroidered first in the extremely important bands of symbols that are employed in every pair of Yao trousers, anywhere from 2 to 5 rows, using weave stitch.

A close-up of the three bands of weave stitching. Originally the weave stitches would have been done in silk thread but lately cotton thread is much more widely used. Following the Iu Mien Yoa tradition, grid stitch has been used for the smaller bands of symbols within these rows.

The inside of the weave-stitch bands, also showing the hemmed cuff.

A close-up view of some of the designs of the next two rows of large colorful embroidery done with grid stitch.

The transition between the 2nd and 3rd bands of embroidery with a smaller geometric design between.


Embroidery at the very tops of the thighs. You can see the different tones of the indigo dye in the very top where the waist band has been sewn to the leg panel.

Final picture of the back side of a stitched panel where it has been sewn to the crotch fabric.