Embroidered bonnets

I bought these really pretty bonnets yesterday. I am trying to find out a little more about them, I think that they come from Slovakia and are about 100 years old. They are beautifully made and rather delicate.

Cross stitch embroidery

Well it was worth the long trip to the Ukraine border to meet Erszike and to see her amazing embroidery for which she has won the prestigious Kis Janos Bóri prize. Beautiful work and we are now working together to develop some designs using slightly different colours and designs than the the very bold traditional Hungarian red!

Weaving hemp

Oh dear its been a long time since I last posted!. Been mad busy with big orders and the summer , nearly at an end, has sped by. This weekend however I did manage to take some time to visit amongst other things, a small village near the Ukraine border which was holding their annual "hemp" festival. This village is incredibly rich in folk craft heritage. My primary purpose was to meet Erszike who is a master embroiderer , I hope that we will be doing some work together in the future. It was a bonus to see the preperation, spinning and weaving of hemp. It just went to remind me what a time consuming process it all is! They still weave in this village, though mostly a hemp and cotton mix. Here are some pictures;

Hemp drying. After the hemp is picked it is soaked in the river of lake for 4- 6 weeks and then dried

The stalks are bashed to releas teh fibres which are then combed

spinning the fibres.....
and finally weaving the cloth, this chap was having a go and finding it very difficult!

Hand crafted dining and kitchen ware

Spent a lovely weekend near Lake Balaton picking cherries and cooking on a fire in the garden. So many cherries, tiny wild strawberries and redcurrants.

One of the lovely things about Hungary is the strong tradition of folk craft and using what one has to hand.... I recently met a master craftsman who fashions bowls and kitchen implements out of wood from his garden. With a choice of cherry, walnut, yew, ash, beech , plum and apple. They will be on the webiste soon but here is a sneak preview, they are entirely natural and finished with linseed oil or beeswax .

Elizabeth Baer Textiles

Elizabeth Baer was at Petworth dispalying her wonderful antique and vintage French textiles and sharing her wealth of knowledge. Here is a picture of a very pretty boudoir chair covered in toile de jouy. My camera skills werent up to much that day, it is not the best picture but you can see more on her website and blog.

fish swimming through the roof

The only obvious advantage of having left my internet stick in the UK is working in a wifi cafe with a shoal of shimmering fish swimming in throuh the roof.

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Parna is featured in the Daily Mail today -Cloth Cult

Parna is featured in the Daily Mail today.