Weaving in Bulgaria

History

Weaving as a craft dates back since ancient times in our lands. Cultural symbiosis between Thracians, Slavs and proto- Bulgarians turns this craft into art. From one side it is originated in the ethnic traits of each ethnicity and from the other side, Byzantium, which is the biggest consumer of cloths, sets the high standards to the quality of the textiles. Ethnography and folklore studies pay great attention to the symbols applied to the cloths. The traits are so well studied that every particular textile can be recognized with its specific region of origin.

Looms

The most popular loom spread almost in every village house was the horizontal home loom. It is used for fine fiber weaving for family needs of clothes, mats, rags,  used for house furnishing. This loom is composed of two wood frames which comprise two beams. The rear beam is for the yarn beam at the front beam the weaved is rolled. The other loom is connected to the East traditions in weaving introduced in our lands with the Persian carpets. The specific of this loom is the lack of shuttle. The yarn is pounded over the beam by wooden hammer or comb.
These techniques let the weaver make plastic pictures on the carpet, where the symmetry specific of Bulgarian traditional carpets and rugs is not compulsory. Every detail is hand made and various spinning techniques are used depending on the desired relief of the carpet.

Traditional Bulgarian horizontal loom

 http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=BLOSwSnAGoo

 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=slc_YJIA5nQ

Materials

The main material used in weaving is wool which preparation includes washing, cleaning of thorns and other impurities, carding, spinning. Fleece is also used which is processed similarly to the wool though it is coarse and hard to manipulate. Fleeces of goat fur are thick, coarse and heavy. Cotton with time is more used for fiber base. It is easer for spinning into finer threads, firm, not vulnerable to atmospheric influence and moths.

Colours

In some places of the country there are more than 50 colour nuances known and used. The variety of nuances is achieved not only by the dyes but also by the thickness of paints, prepared by entirely organic materials.

Weaving today

Today weaving in Bulgaria is preserved in crafts centres. The traditions are taught in the National  ArtsAcademy. There used to be a loom in every household. Nowadays there are few women who still have the looms of their grandmothers and even fewer are those who can use it.

Bulgarian costume

Bulgarian folk costume in Bulgaria is the garments that were worn in Bulgarian villages until the beginning of the 20^th century. These garments were hand made in the villages using materials that were produced locally. The basic structure of the clothing worn by men and women for workdays and holidays remained the same for many hundreds of years, until urban influenced fashion and factory produced clothes became available. The garments that can be seen in ethnographic museums today date from the end of the 19th century and the beginning of the 20th century which is the period when the most elaborate costumes were made. The costumes on display are often those worn for weddings, which had the most layers, and were worn with heavy metal jewellery. After women were married, and later were widowed the number of garments worn was reduced, with those being worn have little or no decoration. By the 1930s the strict adherence to the use of indictors of age in the structure of the garment worn died out.

Bulgarian folk costumes consist of pants, shirts, and vests for men, and dresses and aprons for women. The aprons, dresses, and shirts are usually embroidered in regional colors and folk motifs. Red features heavily in Bulgarian folk dress, but black, green, and white are also a part of traditional clothing from Bulgaria's various regions.

Bulgaria men's costumes and women's costumes can be classified into several categories, although there were not strict boundaries to the occurrence of each costume type, and the styles of costume worn in each region changed over time due to fashion influences and population movements. After Bulgaria was liberated from the Ottomans in 1878, many migrants from the Stara Planina mountains moved down to the Danube plains and took over farms abandoned by the  Turks. This resulted in the double apron and belodrešnik (white men’s) costume being displaced from the foothills of the Stara Planina and parts of north east Bulgaria. In other cases the two costume types were worn side by side by women with the warmer tunic style costumes being worn in winter. Along the Thracian Plain and in the Rhodopes the single apron costume was worn for work in the fields in summer alongside saya and soukman costumes It was also usual in the past for a bride to be taken to her husband's village when they got married taking with her her dowry of which her folk costume formed part. Later her costume was passed on as a gift to her daughter, who again might move to a different village when she got married.

                                           Тhe apron in the garb is hand-woven on a loom

                                                 The garb has beautiful handmade details                                

Thaditional woven socks that were worn in the past

Blankets

In Bulgaria blankets are a compliment to traditional bed covers such as Halishte and Kitenik. They are thin but dense. They keep very warm during long winter nights. Blankets are often woven in a tartan pattern. Whilst some are finely woven and printed with geometrical and flower patterns.

These are hand-made blankets that have been made with a hand-loom.