 work with you on additional furnishings (pillows, bed covers, and cushions) to complete your color scheme.
Schematic drawing of a form of couching.Drawing by Martin Henze.
Couching is an embroidery technique in which laid threads are placed on the surface of the ground material. The laid threads are then fastened down with a separate thread (couching thread) using small tying down couching stitches (often an individual overcast stitch).
This form is frequently used for a line, outline or border. The couching threads may be of the same colour as the laid threads or in a contrasting tone. If more than one line is laid on the ground material, then this technique can be used to cover large areas of ground material relatively quickly, especially if the laid threads are relatively thick. This technique is often (incorrectly) called laidwork.
Couching can be found in many parts of the world, including Europe, India, Indonesia, Japan and the Middle East.
Beadwork in Indonesia is an ancient tradition most prevalent on the islands of Sumatra, Kalimantan, Timor and Sulawesi, where decorative beadwork pieces have been used in ritualistic ceremonies for millennia. In Bali, beadwork has been traditionally used as ornamentation for sacred items. For example, white beads are sewn onto Lontar leaf temple baskets in preparation for offerings. This is a unique method which involves utilizing two needles simultaneously. The Balinese are seemingly the only culture in the world to employ this technique.
Beadwork has become popularized over the years, so that today, there are many wholesalers and retailers in Bali, both foreign and Indonesian, who create a wide variety of intricate and striking beaded designs on sandals, purses, clothing, and many other items.
Ikat (literally means tie and in the malay language it means “to bind”) is a dyeing technique used to pattern textiles that employs resist dyeing on the yarns prior to dyeing and weaving the fabric.
In ikat the resist is formed by binding individual yarns or bundles of yarns with a tight wrapping applied in the desired pattern. The yarns are then dyed. The bindings may then be altered to create a new pattern and the yarns dyed again with another colour. This process may be repeated multiple times to produce elaborate, multicolored patterns. When the dyeing is finished all the bindings are removed and the yarns are woven into cloth. In other resist-dyeing techniques such as tie-dye and batik the resist is applied to the woven cloth, whereas in ikat the resist is applied to the yarns before they are woven into cloth. Because the surface design is created in the yarns rather than on the finished cloth, in ikat both fabric faces are patterned.
A characteristic of ikat textiles is an apparent “blurriness” to the design. The blurriness is a result of the extreme difficulty the weaver has lining up the dyed yarns so that the pattern comes out perfectly in the finished cloth. The blurriness can be reduced by using finer yarns or by the skill of the craftsperson. Ikats with little blurriness, multiple colours and complicated patterns are more difficult to create and therefore often more expensive. However, the blurriness that is so characteristic of ikat is often prized by textile collectors.
In Indonesia ikat textiles are produced throughout the islands from Sumarta in the west to Timor in the east and Kalimantan and Sulawesi in the north.
Songket is a fabric that belongs to the brocade family of textiles of the Malay world (today, Indonesia, Malaysia, Brunei, Singapore and Southern Thailand). It is hand-woven in silk or cotton, and intricately patterned with gold or silver threads. The metallic threads stand out against the background cloth to create a shimmering effect. In the weaving process the metallic threads are inserted in between the silk or cotton weft (latitudinal) threads in a technique called supplementary weft weaving technique.
The term songket comes from the Malay word sungkit, which means “to hook”. It has something to do with the method of songket making; to hook and pick a gr