Making my own noren in a Kyoto studio
One of my most precious experiences in Japan was designing and making a ‘noren’ curtain under the watchful eye of the brilliant designer Miura-san in Nishijin, the traditional textile district of Kyoto. I started writing about this some time back in this post (‘Behind the scenes’) and this post (‘Sketching out’), but did not get round to finishing my story. However I really want to show you the rest of it, so here we go…
A noren is a fabric divider which hangs across the entrance of businesses all across Kyoto, providing a layer of privacy when the door is open, as well as protection from the sun and wind, and advertising space to announce what the shop or business sells. They are hung up at the beginning of the day to show a shop is open for business. Often made of linen and strung from bamboo, they usually feature delicate ink paintings or beautifully drawn Chinese characters. They are at once mysterious and inviting. And I really wanted to learn how to make one. So I asked Miura-san if he would teach me, and I made one for Do What You Love.
First I sketched it out, then I stretched the linen onto a genius contraption (below)…
We mixed up some rice wine ‘neri’ (a gluey solution which isn’t actually glue, but blocks the colour penetrating the fabric)…
…spread it over the areas of the design I wanted to keep the colour of the linen…
…and then brushed a sandy substance over it
Once that was dry, we brushed off the excess sand and were left with a perfectly masked version of my design…
The next stage was the part which saw the most stunning transformation – dyeing the linen in indigo dye. We cooked up the dye in the little kitchen at the back of the studio…
Painted it on with a wide bristle brush (note the bare feet – no shoes allowed inside in Japanese studios!)
These bamboo spreaders helped keep it taut as the linen dried. Love the stunning kimono backdrop – such an inspiring place to work.
We then covered it in a kind of resin to make the colour stay fast….
… and then left it to dry again.
The curtains are now nearly ready – they just need a bit of sparkly Kyoto magic, courtesy of an artisan who works from the attic of her tiny wooden house. Pop back tomorrow to see what we got up to, and what the final product looked like!
