Textile Arts Council

08/19/2026

08/19/2026

08/19/2026

08/16/2026

08/16/2026

Indigo journeys 💙 The Clothworkers’ team is highlighting this beautifully indigo-dyed uchikui from Naha, Okinawa, Japan. It is used for covering gifts and in tea ceremonies, and is known as a fukusa on mainland Japan. It is made from Boehmeria nivea, better known as ramie or Chinese grass and is decorated with the Matsu-Take-Ume (pine, bamboo and plum) motif using the nori-zome rice-paste resist dyeing technique. The design symbolises resilience, good fortune, and high status, three enduring virtues celebrated in Japanese culture.
This textile was acquired by the Museum in 1957 from Dutch collectors Jaap and Laurens Langewis, who travelled extensively to document and collect regional textile traditions to sell to European museums. Jaap lived and worked in Japan between 1952 and 1958, and this piece entered the collection alongside 36 other textiles, stencils and textile-making tools. Their collections are also represented in museums across Europe, including the Victoria and Albert Museum in London and museums in Basel, Rotterdam, Leiden and Amsterdam.

1957.3.18B.

08/15/2026

08/15/2026

Royal boots made of glass beads, cloth and leather. Yoruba culture (from Nigeria, Benin or Togo), 19th century CE, now housed at the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts