I’m in love with the book, Taller Flora by Carla Fernandez. In it she describes the various ways of putting webs (geometric shapes of cloth–squares, rectangles, triangles) together to create dresses, pants, skirts, blouses, shirts, sashes and jackets. Fernandez describes indigenous pre-Hispanic techniques for constructing garments, and compares this with western techniques. Westerners cut cloth to fit the body. Indigenous weavers feature the textile and, make few, if any, cuts into the cloth. 
Their clothing is loose fitting, comfortable, and easily adaptable to another future use. The weaving takes center stage.
Last summer, I eyed a piece of hand woven cloth tucked away on the bottom shelf case of the B&B where we were staying. It’s gloriously rich color spoke to me, and I bought it. It’s been stashed away and yesterday I decided to take it in hand and create a huipil.
Imagine three long, rectangular pieces hand woven on a back-strap loom, each panel (web) 14-1/2” wide x 80” long and hand-stitched together, featuring intricate patterns of stars, birds, fish, crabs, lobster, bugs, deer, and rabbits. It is a brocaded piece from the coastal Mixtec village of Huazotitlan, Oaxaca. I don’t know for certain, but am assuming, that it is dyed with cochineal (red), indigo (blue) and caracol (purple) based on the price I paid for the cloth ($180 USD) — and that was not yet made up into anything!
Above: Example of weaving on a backstrap loom.
Lovingly, I opened the seams and took apart the hand stitching, thinking about the women who created this fabric. How many women’s hands were there? Were they mother and daughter? Dear friends or sisters?
The 4-ply cotton seam threads went on for a while, were knotted off, the trailing thread tucked neatly into the next set of stitches that continued but were different. I could tell they were made by another pair of hands by the way they entered the cloth. This was every bit as sturdy as any machine-made seam. I was deconstructing the panels because two panels would be sufficient to cover my body. I was able to create a huipil without making a single cut in the cloth. Here’s how I did it:
First using small basting stitches, I sewed two panels together at the center seam, being sure to match the direction of the pattern in the weave. I ended the seam at the opening of the neck hole, measuring how big I wanted this to be so the garment would go over my head. I made the total size of the opening 16″, and marked the cloth equally front to back with a straight pin (and tailor’s chalk) so I would know where to stop sewing. I continued to baste from the hem toward the neck on the other side closing the seam the same amount of inches front to back. Then, I held the side seams together to see how much of an armhole I wanted. I decided on a 12” opening for the armhole. So I measured 12” from the shoulder fold down the side-seam, marked it with a straight pin, and began to baste from the hem going up toward the straight pin.
Not being an accomplished Mixtec seamstress, I took the fabric to the sewing machine and used a basting stitch (#4 stitch length on my machine) to sew all the seams together. I decided not to make the machine stitches smaller (#3) because I didn’t want to pull the the brocade fabric together too tightly and I wanted the flexibility to take the garment apart later in case I wanted to do something else with the material. Then, I steamed out all the seams with my iron (gently) so they laid flat. I finished the huipil by folding the bottom over into a ½” hem and sewing the hem by hand using blind stitches. The entire project took me about 3 hours. I didn’t need to finish off the neckline or armholes because the selvages are perfectly beautiful.
I’m really pleased with how this turned out. A huipil of this quality would cost $500+ in any shop in the Santo Domingo – Alcala de Macedeonia neighborhood!
Norma Hawthorne is a North Carolina fiber and jewelry artist, and university administrator, who writes about Oaxaca and living in Teotitlan del Valle on her website www.oaxacaculture.com She is currently organizing weaving and natural dyeing workshops with Federico Chavez Sosa and Eric Chavez Santiago in Teotitlan del Valle.
ADDENDUM: June 5, 2008. I’ve had lots of requests since writing this post for where to purchase the Taller Flora by Carla Fernandez book. I cannot find a U.S. source and intend to try to track down this down on my upcoming trip to Oaxaca. Meanwhile, if you go to the website: www.flora2.com/ you can download the book from a PDF file.
Category Poem: Teotitlan del Valle
Delight of winter warmth,
carved stones from an ancient culture
supporting the Dominican Catholic church,
rusty red coiled bedspring fence,
hot pink bougainvilleas framing arched entries,
braying donkeys — a wake-up call, cobblestones under foot,
the sentinel mount Picacho, looms, dye pots,
cauldrons of fresh hot chocolate, pollo con mole,
Samburguesa’s tacos, Anita’s nieves,
daily market hubbub, abuelas adorned in aprons
and braids, guacalotes gurgling and clucking,
a basketball court at the end of Avenida Juarez ,
hanks of freshly dyed yarn
drying on a wood fence, children in uniform
off to school, coffee at the Sacred Bean, a farmer
leading his bull to pasture, bedspring fence,
faded black mourning ribbon above the doorway,
green quinciniera bouquet, health message graffiti,
un poquito mezcal in teeny green cups, urns of
lilies on the home altar, maize growing in the church
courtyard, aged fife player leading the
marching band, whirling July dancers with feathered
plumes, beeswax candles made by hand,
cat curled in the window box, gnarled hands forming
tamales, songs at Sunday mass, grecas carved
in 2,000 year old stone, hard work, family
celebrations, vintage bus to Benito Juarez painted verdant
mountain adornment, waiting for tourists, life goes on.
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Posted in Cultural Commentary, Oaxaca Mexico art and culture, Teotitlan del Valle
Tagged category poem Mexico, Oaxaca poetry, Teotitlan del Valle