Gobble Gobble

Yesterday's post showed the town of San Antonio and provided an excellent explanation about the weaving that is done there. What yesterday's excellent explanation failed to mention is the technique used to make these beautiful textiles. First you need to know that everything is done by hand. The cloth for the women's skirts is done on a treadle loom. Sure, hours of fun and entertainment, right? But the really nice fabrics like the women's huipils are done on a backstrap loom. Now the fun really begins because you get to kneel while you weave! Yep, hours and hours on your knees. Our good friends at Wikipedia have a photo of a woman weaving this way which is good because your slacker hosts forgot to take one. To give you an idea of how much time you get to spend kneeling, a huipil is made up of two woven pieces. Each piece takes 3 months to make. Just typing that makes me knees ache.

Dear Reader, please remember that each pueblo has a different design/style of huipil. For example, this huipil is from Santa Catarina Palopó on the shores of Lake Atitlán.

A beautiful design and the blues are just amazing. However, we are talking about San Antonio Aguas Calientes and fortunately, your slacker hosts did take photos of the weaving there (and some of them are even almost in focus!) so you can see the results: