Blue

 Blue has always been my favourite colour so, what better delight to offer you from the textile element of my Japan trip than indigo. It is a colour closely associated with Japan and was introduced from either India or China, possibly as early as the 8th Century. The plant has been cultivated ever since, and the lengthy process of growing, harvesting and then processing the leaves to produce the dye seems positively mystical. Fermentation separates the pigment from the leaves of the indigo plant, and the dye vat must be carefully managed to ensure the best colour.

One of the many dioramas telling the story of indigo production in the Aizumicho Museum

We had the pleasure of visiting a number of studios where indigo dying takes place, and two museums of indigo. We learnt several different methods of creating a resist in the fabric, dipping our cloth in dye vats to produce shades from the deepest blue to white. The more often the cloth is dipped, the deeper the blue. Our lessons were given by several delightful experts, all of whom took an obvious pleasure and pride in telling us both about the dye and the process of pattern making. This is quite a long post, so you might like to grab a coffee before you start - or maybe a green tea?

In Izumo we visited the Nagata Dye House, our first introduction to blue hands and the magical transformation of fabric as it emerges from the dye vat, evolving from a dull greeny yellow, through turquoise to a rich blue as it reacts with the oxygen in the air. 

The dye vats are deep ceramic pots buried in the floor to maintain the temperature needed for the indigo. Masao Nagata shows us how his hands get so blue!

The colour from just one submersion.

A poetry of time in trickles of blue.

Nagata-San, father of Masao, is the expert in a resist technique using a thick rice paste known as Tsutsugaki Aizome. You can read about this here if you would like to know more.

The paste is coloured blue so the artist knows where the design has been drawn, and two layers are needed to provide adequate coverage before the fabric goes into the dye

In Yasugi, we were given the chance to practice a shibori technique at the Amano Kouya indigo dyeing studio. It opens from this very unassuming frontage into a deep building with courtyard garden and many different rooms where both dyeing and weaving take place.

Another multi generation dyeworks, this was established in 1870. Hisashi Amano, the fifth generation of dyers here, was wonderfully entertaining in his descriptions of how the process happens, from the large dye vats buried in the floor

to the process of binding and clamping the cloth to create a resist, leaving some fabric white, and how the colour is built up by repeated submersion in the dye. 

Here I used a combination of simple binding with elastic bands, along with two pairs of chopsticks, bound tightly with more elastic bands, to exclude the dye from the cloth

Hisashi was also a pretty cool guy with a fine understanding of how to publicize his craft.

Our efforts were extremely rewarding, resulting in wonderful depth of colour with up to five dips in the vats. Not those in the floor, I might add, but more accessible large tanks for studio guests. Differences in the tones were achieved by removing some of the binding during the process. Mine is the third one in from the left if you want to know how those bindings turned out.

Of course, we were served green tea in the garden afterwards.

Moving on to Yamamoto, we learned a wax resist technique at the Roketsu Wax Resist dyeing studio. As with many places in Japan there was a tiny, immaculate garden outside to draw us in to the studio.

Again we were hosted by the charming owner, and shown how to apply hot wax to our fabric with a classic Japanese brush, before submerging it in the wonderful blue dye.

The little drawers below the samples hold a myriad of designs to trace from. I selected a dragon, which may have been a bit ambitious. The design, covered in wax proof paper, is placed on a light box so you can see where to apply the wax when your fabric is laid on top. I think I managed a reasonable job. 

Once we had dipped our fabrics they were retrieved from the dye vat and plunged into very hot soapy water to remove the wax, and hung up to dry.

The "cooker" behind holds the pots of boiling water for washing out the wax

My slightly lumpy dragon hangs in the foreground!

One of the many beautiful hangings produced at the studio by those with many years of practice.

Did we all come away with blue hands? No, we were liberally protected with aprons, gloves and shoe coverings to ensure we stayed pristine throughout!

As well as being shown the magic of indigo dyeing first hand, we visited two beautiful museums of indigo. The first, in Tokushima, was the Aizumicho Historical Museum of Indigo. Here we saw the most incredibly detailed examples of the shibori technique, a method where the cloth is tightly bound so it remains white when dipped in the dye vat. The design on the cloth is entirely dependent on how this is done.

A stitched resist involves running regular stitches through the fabric. These are then drawn up tight and tied off: the pattern reflects the pattern of the stitches

Below, the shapes of the petals in the centre and the squares are stitched, then the thread is pulled up tightly and bound around the peak of the fabric so it is mostly white, except on the exposed folds.

This delicately shaded kimono has been decorated with a bound resist. The fabric is gathered into tiny peaks with precise regularity and tightly tied. The dark of the flowing leaves and seeds reveals the unbound area.

If you look closely you will see that the field of white has tiny amounts of blue in little dots and grids across its entirely, all defined by the way it has been pulled up and bound with thread. When you run your fingers across fabric treated this way you can feel the myriad of little bumps where it has been drawn up and tied.

Such precision takes many years of practice to perfect.

Our second museum, The Little Indigo Museum was tucked away in the foothills in a small village called Miyama.

Here you will find the life's work of Hiroyuki Shindo, who devoted himself to learning the techniques of indigo dyeing when it was being forgotten. He has built up a varied collection of indigo textiles from both Japan and further afield.

Mr Shindo, a sweet faced man in his eighties, first told us about his journey in indigo and talked about his workshop space. He is renowned for his indigo dyeing and experimental techniques and has work exhibited in galleries across the world. There is a wonderful video about him here. Once again, indigo vats sunk into the floor, twelve of them with their wooden covers.

Then we were shown up the narrow wooden stairs to the roof space where his collection is displayed. It was an extraordinary place, with its structure of supporting poles and straw thatch providing a complex geometry in which to look at the variety of textiles on display

Woven indigo and white fabric from Ghana

A polka dot dress from Bordeaux

Detail of a quilt made by Mr Shindo's mother from scraps of indigo many many moons ago

I loved these playful rabbits dancing across a kimono.

The following day we had our final indigo experience as we visited Arimatsu, once the heart of the shibori industry. I have been wanting to go there since I first started my own experiments with shibori more than ten years ago, so this was a real highlight for me. This quiet street sits within the much larger bustling city of Nagoya, and you could easily miss it amongst all the big modern buildings. 

A very traditional wooden frontage to this building; I loved the patterns made by those slim slats of dark wood.

Tiles abound, on rooves and walls, and of course, there are trees peeping up from tiny spaces between and behind.

We visited the Shibori Museum where we were given another tutorial in a shibori technique. Sekka shibori is a method where a length of fabric is carefully folded and bound between two triangular blocks of wood. There is a brief video here which shows you a little bit about the various techniques including the one we were allowed to try.  

This time a bit of extra colour was used. I was really pleased with the result - detail below.

We were introduced to this delightful 93 year old lady, who has been practicing her tying skills since the age of 10. She has been recognised as a "Living National Treasure" in Japan and was presented with her certificate by the prime minster.

Here she is making minute stitches on the cloth according to the pattern of dots you can see just behind her hand and on her lap above. They have been pulled up tight on the right of the image, where a group of pre threaded needles are waiting efficiently for the next row of stitching. The speed with which she ran the needle through the cloth was mesmerising.

The museum hold so many beautiful examples of shibori it was hard to choose which to include here, 

And then the shops in the main street had yet further delights to tempt us. I brought back several bags of scraps, just to play with, as the larger pieces were outside my price range.

I made sure to wear my koi dress that day so I could have a picture taken outside the museum.

You can see from my face how much I enjoyed this, and all the other indigo experiences we had in Japan. I do hope you have enjoyed sharing them with me.