double wrap belt in textile and leather

thick belt in textile and leather

textile purses

textile purse on form

black and white quartered cowl

large-buttoned cowl with fringe

wrapped scarf with button and fringe

looped shawl with fringe

crocheted sweater

dress with floral pattern

ruana with symbols

Several of these final prototypes are in production and for sale now. For wholesale or retail inquiries, please contact the Chol Chol Foundation at info@cholchol.org.

Fair trade indigenous art: preserving culture and relieving poverty.

The Foundation specializes in traditional, completely natural, Mapuche textiles and knits ranging from wall hangings, rugs, blankets, and table cloths to ponchos, shawls, scarves, hats, and gloves.

Chol Chol Foundation's exclusive fair trade store

All patterns and symbols are uniquely Mapuche, and represent cosmological stories of their religion as well as elements of the natural world.

Folded textiles woven by Mapuche artisans

The yarn used for each piece is hand-spun, and every color is dyed from natural brews of native plants and fruits.

Mural Trarikan: ceremonial Mapuche wall art

As with this Trarikan, some textiles are still made with ancient techniques involving dying with mud that is knotted with reeds. Mapuche textile art is still intimately connected with spirituality of the Mapuche people.

Traditional Mapuche Loom

Weaving knowledge has been passed down in the Mapuche communities of Chile from mother to daughter for countless generations, and even today most women report having learned from their families. Tapestries, blankets, and clothes are woven from traditional rectangular looms built of wooden frames. This weaving technique allows for the weavers to blend symbols, patterns and textures.

Mapuche ladies weaving in their kitchen

Mapuche weaving is made completely sustainably using traditional techniques on home-built frame looms.  Weaving is liberating to women of the Araucanía region because it can be done from home, meaning they can raise their families in their communities. Women can make an income without having to leave for cities to find employment, presenting an alternative to rural flight.

Diagram of a Mapuche Loom

Weaving is key to environmental and cultural preservation in the Aracaunía region. As opposed to deforestation seen often in struggling indigenous communities, when a craft uses only easily replenishable materials, no plants or animals are destroyed in the process. Furthermore, the Mapuche weaving technique relies solely on hand-spun yarn and natural dyes crafted from 100% sustainably harvested vegetation: no pollution results from machines or harmful chemicals. Mapuche weaving is a productive livelihood that results in a net-positive affect on the environment (as it encourages bio-diversity in the plants used and the dye pulp can be used as fertilizer).

More importantly, weaving helps preserve the culture of the Mapuche people.  The more weaving is practiced, the more Mapuche craft techniques and styles are shared.  The symbols in the textiles refer to images from Mapuche history and cosmological beliefs, and are often used to tell graphic stories.  When women can make a living from weaving, they are able to practice and teach their culture as a part of their profession. In the process, much of this knowledge is imparted upon the younger generation.  Furthermore, when those textiles are created and circulated, the Mapuche story is also celebrated beyond the rural communities of their creators.

Mapuche Lady Weaving

]]> http://indigenousinnovation.com/2009/10/27/artesania-mapuche-textile/feed/ 0 Jasmine traditional loom Mapuche ladies weaving in their kitchen Museo Canete Mapuche Lady Weaving http://indigenousinnovation.com/2009/09/21/artesania-mapuche-la-fundacion-chol-chol/ http://indigenousinnovation.com/2009/09/21/artesania-mapuche-la-fundacion-chol-chol/#comments Mon, 21 Sep 2009 15:18:33 +0000 Jasmine http://indigenousinnovation.com/?p=647 ]]>

Textiles at the Chol Chol Foundation

The weaving from the 38 Mapuche communities we work with is beautiful, with earthy tones and graphic symbolic patterns representing different visual elements of Mapuche spirituality. All wool is carded from sheep in the Aracaunía region, and shipped locally.

raw wool drying before being spun

The women spin the wool by hand into variety of different textures of yarn: thin, thick, smooth, textured, with single or double fibers twisted.

Mapuche mother spinning wool in her kitchen

The yarn is then dyed naturally with plant or mud brews from materials harvested sustainably in their communities. Colors of the wool change from season to season based on the acidity of the ground or the types of vegetables or flowers in bloom. Chile, garlic, herbs, mud and the like make common ingredients.

chile, herbs, corn, and garlic being dried for dyes

mother and daughter dying yarn

boiling plants, dying yarn

boiling plants, dying yarn

freshly died yarn, drying in back yard

bundled up

Palacio de la Moneda, Artasania de Chile Mapuche exhibit, Santiago

The Mapuche are best known for their craft traditions in textiles, silver jewelry, wood, and basket weaving.  Many of the patterns, symbols, and techniques still used date back to pre-colonial times.

Here are some examples from Artasanía de Chile’s gallery at la Palacio de la Meneda in downtown Santiago.

Plata

(Silver)

silver and beaded traditional Mapuche jewelry

head pieces, worn in a circle around the top of the the head.

These are clothing pins, used to hold wrapping sweaters together as you wear them.

traditional Mapuche jewlery, worn by women for ceremonies

head pieces, worn in a circle around the top of the the head.

Textil, Lana

(Textile, Wool)

The textiles at the museum represented Mapuche work from many regions, and the pieces on display were up to one hundred years old. Patterns vary from community to community, as do the colors.  Since the wool is died naturally from plants in each region, and the plant varieties differ with the terrain, the colors of textiles are unique to their origin.

Alfombra (rug), gallery de Artesanía de Chile, Palacio de la Moneda

Alfombras tradicionales, Palacio de la Moneda, Artasania de Chile exhibit

Alfombras tradicionales, Palacio de la Moneda, Artasania de Chile exhibit

alfombras tradicionales, Palacio de la Moneda, Artasania de Chile exhibit

Alfombras tradicionales, Palacio de la Moneda, Artasania de Chile exhibit

traditional Trarihues, women's belts for ceremony

ponchos, Palacio de la Moneda, Artasanias de Chile exhibit, Santiago

Madera y Cestas

(Wood and Baskets)

Mapuche spirit sculptures, wood. Palacio de la Moneda, Artasania de Chile exhibit.

Mapuche baskets, Palacio de la Moneda, Artasanias de Chile exhibit

The designs you see here are are all  from the gallery of Fundación Artesanías de Chile.  The crafts originate in communities from all over the country.  Many of these crafts are still being made and used similarly today.

Azul advertisement, Providencia bus stop, Santiago, Chile

a contemporary design, Galeria Del Mundo, Santiago, Chile

When exploring the streets of Santiago one sees throes of elegantly clad Latins rushing to their destinations and stores which explode with colors and shapes.  You cannot help but feel you are witnessing an exciting new design era take root in Chile’s capital city. Neighborhoods such as Lastarria, Bellas Artes, and Bella Vista are springing up with interesting boutiques, experimental fashions, theaters, and fancy restaurants.  Fledgling creative ventures ranging from stores that only support unique Chilean designs to art collectives, seem to be flourishing in uncharted territory.

According to an interview by LAMA, Latin America in the Modern Age blog, with designers Rina and Pamela of Santiago’s Studio Grafíkk:

“The design scene in Santiago is growing and growing every day. There’s a lot of talented designers and very good manufacturers. Also it helps that there’s emerging neighborhoods with young design studios and shops. In six years, everything changed a lot, with the emerging Chilean economy (despite of the latest world economy crisis), design has found its place.”

Belles Artes, Santiago, Chile

Cafe Boa, Santiago, Chile

Santiago is a classy city, a Europeanized culture upon Latin American roots. It is considered one of the most developed cities of Latin America and presents a melange of images. There are pictures of a developing nation: stunning street art celebrating Pablo Neruda, delicious empanada stands, dirty dogs, colorful indigenous Chilean crafts in flea markets, and loud Reggaeton streaming from noisy Discoteques.  All this upon a backdrop of shiny modernism – gleaming buildings, beautiful public parks, clean and efficient transportation systems, dizzying malls, excellent universities, and people in suits smoking cigarettes.  But turn a one more corner, and you will discover a grand palace like Santa Lucia standing guard to the memory of the Spanish occupation. Forming an impression of Santiago is confusing, because the things you see connote a broad combination of cultures and places.  These factors, however, are exactly what make Santiago ripe for a design movement yet unknown to the world. Chileans know how to present their creativity in a polished European manner – yet experiment with indigenous aesthetics, textiles, lines, and colors only seen in the wildest Latin American imaginations. This is Chile’s design capital.

Hall Central, Design Collective, Santiago, Chile

Unique, hand-made, contemporary designs at ONA, Santiago.

Yet to put this in perspective, less than two decades ago Chile was struggling to end military dictatorship and come into democratic rule.  Since the early 90’s, Chile’s government has been steadfastly stabilizing the economy.  Only recently, in the last six years or so, has the economy reached a degree of affluence that can support a design and art scene – since there is only a demand for these things when people can spend beyond necessities.  Furthermore, only in the last twenty years has the country been stable and safe enough to invite a strong tourism industry – contributing more to the demand which now supports design, arts, and crafts.

Johanne McKay, ONA shop, Santiago, Chile

So the picture is that people are getting really turned on to design, but there is still a lot of room for growth, new spaces to be developed, new ideas, new styles, new brands and new elegant bars or restaurants. Unlike, say, over-saturated Barcelona or Paris, here people are just opening the doors to cultural design pride and style.  But the designs are characteristically chic, and a lot of shop owners are adamant about “Chilean only” “unique only” “handmade only” and “yes we think design innovation with Mapuche would be interesting.”   I think the time is right and the context welcoming for a design line such as the one I am creating with the Chol Chol Foundation.

Designer Chaleco, Kelgwo, Hall Central Design Collective, Santiago, Chile

Art Galleries in BellaVista

Provedencia Sculpture Garden, Santiago, Chile

Things become even more interesting when I began interviewing boutique vendors and citizens of Santiago, the design and culture capital of Chile and the Chol Chol Foundation’s priority target market.  I noticed a surprising lack of Mapuche textiles or goods across all the traditional artisan shops in touristy locations.  There were explicit messages from citizens and implicit messages from shop inventories that the Mapuche culture was apart from Chilean culture, and that the Mapuche faced discrimination both in social perceptions and the marketplaces.  People interviewed across Santiago did not perceive the Mapuche people as educated or artistic, and did understand why I had chosen to work with them.  Many explained to me that anti-Mapuche racism is deeply rooted in the Chilean culture and was one of the major obstacles the Mapuche people faced in entering the design market here.

Opinionated Chilean at a BBQ in Southern Santiago, "Why the Mapuche?"

“But their cultural history is not interesting or artistic, why do you want to design with them?” – The man pictured above.

“People don’t want to hire [Mapuche] because they are not seen as good workers, because they are angry that they are forced to be menial workers in a country that was once theirs […] I don’t mean to be racist the facts are the facts, they are at the lowest levels of society, in terms of money and education” – Philipp K.

“Here in Santiago, the women have deep pockets but how do you say it?  They will not spend on Mapuche.” – Anya K.

Though many talked about discrimination, most did not feel that way. People I spoke to – most importantly shop owners – were quite interested in hearing more about the project. I think Santiago is ready to embrace Mapuche work – since the museums and a few design stores have already started to proudly embrace Mapuche traditions as “Chile’s ethnic culture” (La Moneda Museum gift store). Also, though a lot of people critically questioned me for working with them, they all listened to what I had to say open-mindedly, and I was able to communicate the potential of Mapuche textile work to many.  It was fascinating to discover how many were shocked that I had come from the United States to design with the Mapuche, a culture several people I talked to did not associate as artistic.

Contemporary Chilean Designs, Galeria Del Mundo, Santiago, Chile

Galeria Del Mundo, Santiago, Chile

Galería del Mundo, pictured here, is a rare but perfect example of an artesanía store featuring indigenous crafts from all over Chile as well as handmade contemporary designs.  There were a few items from the Mapuche communities, woven bags and silver jewelry, but nothing from the Chol Chol Foundation. The owner was excited to hear that I would be working directly with a group of Mapuche women in collaborative product design. Adjacent to a classy café and modern art gallery on Lastarria Avenue, a chic somewhat touristy neighborhood, this boutique represents the perfect place for contemporary elegant Mapuche fashions and exactly why Santiago is ready for this sort of concept.

Mapuche Gallery, La Moneda, Santiago, Chile

A: A fair trade product is one that has been cultivated, grown, or manufactured to comply to a unified set of standards regarding just treatment and payment for producers and workers. The standards are mandated and regulated by a group of organizations called “FINE”: Fairtrade Labelling Organizations International, World Fair Trade Organization, Network of European Worldshops and European Fair Trade Association.

As I delved deeper and deeper into the fair trade culture in America through talking to those ranging from figures in the movement to shop assistants, I began figuring out what exactly made something a fair trade product, how those products go from material to artisan/farmer to shelf, and the social entrepreneurship that accompanies these creative business models. Also fascinating is how webs of fair trade organizations, suppliers, vendors, and festivals all collaborate; these products are exchanged pretty differently from corporate products, and sold mostly in the “festival booth,” “Whole Foods,” “small new age,” “foreign import,” or “fair trade shop” venues.  Stores don’t usually work with artisans directly, and most artisan groups are served by organizational intermediaries who “translate” their designs, marketing presentation, and/or literally language, to “contemporary markets” aka “capitalistic markets” aka “places that people have disposable income and spend it on pretty things.” Mostly these organizations are non-profit.

Fair Trade Social Action Group

But most people still equate Fair Trade with coffee and chocolate (thinking with their stomachs)(Alter Eco Fair Trade Study 2008). Even so, a new fair trade fashion and accessory design movement is well under way, growing to significant proportions. And “modern” product designers have been a secret ingredient to advancing fair trade products for at least a decade. (Aid to Artisans was the first organization to start bringing product designers to impoverished artisan communities to show them how to make more marketable products).

I assure you my research has been thorough – yet I have yet to see fair trade fashions or accessories that do much more than make me say: what a gorgeous Nepalese/Mexican/African/Colombian [thing], oh, and also a good cause. Granted, for me, and many other consumers, that is enough to convince me to buy it. But usually, if a consumer already has a traditional Indian scarf, they won’t buy another similar looking one.  And if an Indian fair trade scarf looks the same as a non-fair-trade Indian scarf – neither will a shop owner: if it’s not unique they can’t afford the price difference.
All the leading fair trade fashion + accessory brands put their humanitarian message first and design second: see for yourselves: (Global Mamas, Aid to Artisans, Manos de Madres, Mama Shaman, Spiral Foundation, Maya Botanika.)  Unfortunately, people don’t buy with their brains.

Compare the way these website homepages look, for example.  The first is a fair trade non-profit serving women in South America.

In comparison, here are two screen shots from the website of Kuna, Peru:

First image of their homepage

First page of their online catalogue

The differences in aesthetic between the first and second websites – both used to sell clothing and accessories – are pretty clear.  However, the first organization is probably supported by grants, and the latter is largely profitable, with stores across every museum, airport, and city of Peru.

And just to use a personal example, do the fair trade fashion and accessory products out there give me the aesthetic butterflies the way walking into a French BCBG Max Azria store does? No. Why? Presentation, style, and cut: I think the products are awesome, but they don’t make me “look hot.”

Many people cite expensive prices as the main obstacle for the fair trade movement for two reasons. First, handmade products take much more human labor to create than their machine-produced counterparts, and second, those who make the products are not exploited – getting paid justly for their time.  However, a BCBG bag can still cost up to 150 times as much as your typical fair trade fashion accessory ($500 versus $$30).  And guess what? BCBG doesn’t pay their laborers fair wages, and also probably sells a lot more bags.  Besides obvious material costs, WHY the stark difference???

Fair Trade connotes “crafty,” and Haute Couture connotes “luxury.”  The two categories are at the present moment distinct. A small amount of the population – fair trade informed and liberally minded – will pay for the first category because they care.  But a LOT more people will pay money for the second category.

This is why fair trade NGO’s are not economically self-sustainable – they presently depend on grants and volunteer fees, always lingering dangerously close to extinction. The artisans themselves, at least at my foundation, are producing far below their capacity while the foundation waits for more orders.

So I quickly understood how interesting my work would be for the Mapuche weavers of the Chol Chol Foundation.  I need to use product, marketing, and graphic design to serve the Mapuche weavers by giving their products a design brand and style that looks as elegant to buyers as profit-driven brands do. Make these gorgeous Mapuche product forms flattering and unique (the textiles themselves  already are).  Make the products physically distinct and recognizable in a crowded marketplace, so that people will come to associate our style with a humanitarian initiative. Present the products in a manner that actually connotes luxury through a new marketing strategy and website design. Looks first, story later.

Bettina, SF, storefront

How does the fashion industry work?

Who buys clothes, and who sells them?

What do people like to buy and sell in stores?

What are the different types of boutiques, shops and fashion corporations are in the Bay Area, and how do they differ?

How do you make clothes and fashion accessories?

What makes a product “Fair Trade” and how are those products traded and sold in the world?

“Hello, my name is Jasmine, I will be working for a fair trade organization of indigenous weavers in Southern Chile to help them design a line for contemporary boutique audiences. May I ask who buys for your store, how I may contact them, and how they choose the products here? And by the way, what do you look for in design?”

Ecoboutique Ladita, SF. Eco-friendly fashion.

These are some of the mind-bogglingly large questions I asked as I began walking down bustling sidewalks of the San Francisco Bay Area shopping nexus. My little sketch book had a map-like checklist of all of the shopping streets I had come to memorize growing up as a girl here. To the South there was the Peninsula: University Avenue Palo Alto, Castro Street Mountain View, Santa Cruz Ave in Menlo Park, Saratoga. The East, there was Berkeley: Fourth Street, Telegraph, College Avenue, and Oakland and Emeryville coming up now. To the North, Marin: Mill Valley, Sausalito, Larkspur, Tiburon, San Anselmo, Fairfax, downtown Novato.  Even further North, the wine country: downtown Sonoma, Napa, St. Helena, Calistoga.  And then of course San Francisco: Mission/Valencia, Castro, Noe Valley, Bernal Heights, Hayes Valley, Union Street, Filmore Street, Haight Street, and Union Square if I dared.

The goal was to traverse as much of this territory and meet as many people as possible in one week, figure out how to design products that would sell in this community, and learn how to get my future fair trade products distributed in the United States.

The Store, Mill Valley

While walking door to door in search of answers and further questions, I specifically sought out these types of stores: mid to high-end contemporary boutiques (fashion, home-furnishing, and industrial design), import stores with more traditional/exotic foreign products, and eco / green / fair trade / new age stores which concentrated on social principles.  All three target markets could comfortably host products crafted in modern style which exhibited foreign aesthetics and social consciousness.  In effect, this product line will strive to bridge the gap between these three types of audiences in a new way: bringing not only uniquely interesting shapes to foreign and fair trade stores accustomed to traditional aesthetics, but also socially responsible products to the mainstream. In addition to looking for venues for the contemporary line, I also wanted to help the foundation find more places that were appropriate for their traditional products.

I wanted not only to meet these vendors for future contact, but also to hear their take on the project and any ideas they may have had to contribute. After all, they are they experts on what sells to whom.  I was also interested in seeing what sort of fashion, accessory, and product trends are appreciated most in these places and how much everything sold for. Once I explained the nature of my humanitarian-aimed project, most people were happy to offer contact and advice between customers.

In every store I deemed even remotely relevant I would follow a certain routine.  First, I would pretend to be a customer: taking particular interest in any bags, scarves, or woven/knit items in the shop that were aesthetically relevant to what I had in mind for our innovations.  When things struck me as interesting or if I wanted to figure out how they were made, I would innocently try things on in the dressing room to study them. I was interested in the shapes of soft bags, and things that looked great in textile.  The sorts of things I could imagine in Mapuche weaves. Then, depending on how welcoming the staff was or how appropriate the store fit seemed, I would strike up conversation. After a little description of my work, I would gauge how receptive the employees were and ask questions appropriately. I took note of how my design line could fit in, what sort of styles worked, who the clientele were, how much things cost, and by what process that store obtained products.

The Store in Mill Valley, CA

Through nearly a hundred of these casual interviews I learned a tremendous amount about commercial fashion, how the system works, vendors, buyers, markets, gift and fashion shows, accessory manufacturing, consignment, wholesale, profits, fashions reps, intermediaries, taxes, seasons, sizes, brands, whew!  It’s pretty complicated.

(Almost as complicated as making the multi-pocketed handbags the system operates to sell: buckles, hinges, structure, types of stitches, weight capacity, volume and lightness, lining, magnetic clasps, zippers, fabric tactility and durability – what fun!)

In general, people in the Bay Area (hippies, yuppies, hipsters, new agers, dot comers, students, professionals, etc.) were very receptive to the idea of modernly fashionable Fair Trade, and also seemed excited that indigenous people would be profiting from the designs instead of corporations. Vendors were happy to hear that the project could make the Mapuche’s hand-woven products more complimentary to their fashion selections.  A series of allies revealed themselves in this process; some store owners would get so excited as to sketch ideas that came to mind, others pointed me to interesting websites relevant to the project, others gave me cell phones numbers of people to talk to, and many were open to seeing my products once developed.

Mill Valley Hat Box, a lovely place for Mapuche scarves?