|
 Dear Customers & Friends
Hello from Japan! This is Kimono Flea Market ICHIROYA's News letter No.265.
We have been selling kimono and kimono fabrics for these 7 years (thank you very much for your patronage!), we have been often puzzled about how we should convey the texture and touch of fabrics. We took and showed many detailed photos, and added description about softness, and made fabric sample cards. However, still we often think they are not enough, but we are selling by internet shop, and letting you touch fabrics is impossible. We always thank you for buying from us in spite of such conditions.
We would like to write about Japanese silk fabrics again in the netter.
When we describe the fabrics of kimono, we often use these words.
'Hiraginu'
'Habutae'
'Rinzu'
'Chirimen'
'Kinsha'
'Shusu'
'Hiraginu' is the plain silk. Hira means `flat` and ginu(kinu)means `silk`.One of the most typical 'hiraginu' is the 'habutae', which is often used as men's formal kimono and haori. It has very smooth plain texture and touch. It is because textils is woven with most basic technique - 'plain weave', and its silk yarn is not twisted. So with microscope, surface looks as a grind pattern, and silk yarns are also straight, and both weft and warp yarns come out equally. Because of such structure, 'hiraginu' has very smooth touch.
Here is the detail figure of three kinds of weaving technique. The first one is the figure of 'plain weave'.
Click Here
( To get larger image, please click the right mouse button on the image - button for enlargement appears in the right lower corner. )
'Hiraginu' is often used as juban(undergarment) fabric and haori lining fabrics. Please keep in mind that if we write 'hiraginu', textile has comparatively thin touch ( it is because yarns are not twisted and has simple texture as above).
'Chirimen'(crepe) and 'Kinsha'(very fine crepe) are woven also with 'plain weave' technique.
chirimen:Click Here
kinsha: Click Here
However, silk yarns are twisted strongly.
Here are the images of yarn, which are twisted.
Click Here
To weave 'chirimen'(crepe), rightward-ply and leftward-ply weft yarns are woven alternately. So textile has such ragged surface and it is thick because of twisted yarns. 'Kinsha' is also made of same way, but ply is more fine and yarns are thin, and has exceptionally soft and delicate touch.
We only used these two words when the textile has very prominent feature of 'chirimen' and 'kinsha', however, some customers may notice that most kimono bolts have the word stamp in the end, which reads 'chirimen'.
Click Here
Click Here
Usually kimono fabrics are 'chirimen' or 'rinzu', if we use the word 'chirimen' in a broad sense. Also above komon silk fabric is woven with twisted weft, and has slightly 'chirimen' like touch. If the twisted yarns are used as weft, textile can be called 'chirimen', and seems to be sold as 'chirimen' especially sold as solid white fabric before dyeing. However, end users and retailers use the word 'chirimen' only when the ply is very strong and it has prominent feature.
About word 'kinsha', it is also the words used by kimono lovers, and only indicate vintage fabrics. We have never come across 'contemporary kinsha silk'. Vintage 'kinsha' fabrics have exceptionally soft, delicate and comfortable touch, and making similar ones seem to be very difficult and expensive ( it may be because of the silk's quality - it is the story about the Koishimaru, which we wrote in the past news letter.)
Please keep it mind that if there is not specific explanation about textile in our site, textile is this kind of 'chirimen' in a broad sense.
'Rinzu' is made of 'twill weave' technique.
Figure is the second one.
Click Here
There are lots of variety of weaving pattern, and it can make various pattern with this weaving technique. Many kimono is made of 'rinzu' silk fabric, and most of silk yarns seem to twisted more or less.
'Shusu' silk is woven with 'satin weave' technique.
Figure is the last one.
Click Here
'Shusu' seems to be the same as 'satin' in English. Crossing points are very less, and most surface is made weft (or warp). Because of this structure, surface is more shiny and smooth than plain silk, but it is weaker than it. Shusu silk is not used as kimono fabric usually. However, some vintage nagoya obis are made of shusu silk, and often embroidery works were done on them. Vintage and antique fukusa were often made of shusu silk, and they also have wonderful embroidery works.
We are very happy if this letter help you to image our fabrics' touch and texture in the display.
Thank you very much for reading the end. Today we will list some fukusa, uchishiki, women's hakama, karinui fabric, bolt and antique items! We are very happy if you could find your favorite among them!
Have a nice weekend!
Ichiro & Yuka Wada
Kimono Flea Market "ICHIROYA"
http://www.ichiroya.com
e-mail: info@ichiroya.com
address: Asia-shoji Bldg.301
1841-1 Nishi 1 chome
Wakamatsu cho
Tondabayashi city
Osaka 584-0025 JAPAN
TEL&FAX ****( international number ) - 81-721-23-5446
Larger Figure
|