A two-and-a-half-hour boat ride from Puno on Lake Titicaca, itself a day’s bus ride from Cusco, brings you to the remote island of Taquile, whose indigenous Quechua-speaking inhabitants weave and knit some of the finest textiles in the Andes. Rising more than 700 feet above Titicaca’s vast expanse, this rocky island has been home to its Quechua-speaking community since before the time of the Incas. Ancient ruins on the island date from 1200 CE and pre-Columbian farming terraces are still cultivated. Due to its isolation, the island was one of the last communities of the Inca empire to be brought under control of the Spanish in the sixteenth century. The Spaniards renamed the place Taquile after a prominent Spanish nobleman. … Read More
Indigo Mules
We flew to Peru carrying precious cargo in our suitcases—seventeen 1-pound bags triple-wrapped in plastic, and labeled “Ground Indigofera Tinctoria” just in case our bags were searched. This wasn’t the first time we were asked to be “indigo mules” and I’m sure we haven’t been the only carriers over the years. This indigo would be given as gifts to each of the ten weaving communities, association members of the Center for Traditional Textiles of Cusco (CTTC), who the ATA board and volunteers would be visiting in late October (2022). Recovering Natural Dye Usage Since the 1990s, the CTTC has worked to recover the practice of natural dyeing in the Cusco region. Through extensive research, attending workshops, talking with natural dye … Read More
The Re-Emergence of Ticlla-Watay: An Overview
A number of pre-Columbian textiles are so technically sophisticated that scholars today can’t be sure how they were made. Breathing new life into “lost” textile forms has been an important focus of the ten community weaving associations of the Center for Traditional Textiles of Cusco (CTTC), where they continue to re-vitalize Andean textile traditions and techniques. Between roughly 600 and 900 CE, the Nazca and Wari peoples evolved a very complex textile form, referred to as “Wari tie dye” by museums and scholars. These ancient pieces rival 1960’s tie dye in their vibrant designs, but the techniques are dauntingly complex, combining resist dyeing and multi-colored, de-constructed, and re-constructed woven cloth shapes. In 2020 Andean artisan weavers living in several of … Read More
A Virtual Visit to the Weavers of Cusco: A Special Benefit Program
We hope that you will join us on April 1 for a special event to benefit the communities of the Center for Traditional Textiles of Cusco (CTTC). The CTTC supports groups of weavers in ten villages, each community with its own unique dress, textiles, and techniques. The weavers depend on sales of their textiles to help support their families and send their children to school. For several years, COVID halted tourism and, thus, textile sales. Now, just as Andean communities were beginning to recover and regain hope, the political strife in Peru has brought tourism to a halt, once again. But where there are caring hearts, there is always hope On April 1, ATA and CTTC are teaming up to … Read More
Cataloging & Using Traditional Designs
The Center for Traditional Textiles of Cusco (CTTC) has long understood the importance of documenting weaving designs, techniques, and other textile traditions that were disappearing over time. One of the early goals was to create a simple design catalog as a physical archive documenting a woven example of each design and its name. In 2020, the CTTC completed the documenting of the designs from all ten communities, finishing it during Covid, which helped to maintain contact with the weavers. In 2021, the CTTC expanded the design catalog from a physical archive to a digital database, taking photos of all the designs and collecting histories from the weavers about each design. By the end of this year, all of the CTTC’s … Read More
Chuspas: Small Bags with Big Significance
When I started researching this topic, I was merely focused on the one very old chuspa that I had in my collection, which I purchased in Peru in 1980. Chuspa is a Quechua word for bag or purse. Elaborate chuspas are used as part of dancers’ costumes during festivals; every-day, smaller chuspas often carry money (these chuspas are also called monederos). I knew that chuspas also are used for carrying coca leaves, but I never thought about the significance of coca to the Andean culture. I had only been told that the Indigenous Quechua speakers would chew the leaves to help give them energy or to keep from getting hungry. While chuspas are made using traditional techniques, the sacred substance … Read More
The Finishing Touch for Andean Textiles
It’s rare to see an Andean textile without an added border, whether an attached band, braid, or fringe, or an exquisite, embellished seam. So much care and attention go into the finishing details, that many weavers in the Andes look forward to these finishing touches. Finishing details are also very practical. Seams hold two handwoven cloths together for items such as ponchos, blankets, and mantas, while borders and fringes prevent edges from fraying. When borders, edges, and seams wear through, a weaver will carefully take them out and put in new ones, extending the life of the textile for many more years. Joins & Seams Since Andean textiles are woven on a backstrap loom, the width of the cloth is … Read More
Monederos for Your Money
Women in the Andes of Peru and Bolivia knit colorful purses and bags in every shape imaginable. Since they hold coins (monedas in Spanish), the purses are called monederos. In the late 1800s, little purses in the shape of llamas, bulls, fish, birds, and people complete with detailed clothing were common, especially among wealthy women. Over a hundred years ago, Andean women used tiny knitted purses made of fine silk or vicuña thread to hold the small gold coins in use at the time. A wealthy woman wanting to impress her guests might greet them at the front door wrapped in a shawl, carrying a rosary, and holding a superbly detailed purse in her hand, as an object of status … Read More
Unraveling the Mystery of Khipus
I don’t remember the first time I read about khipus (also spelled quipus). Most likely, it was the summer that I spent at a Spanish language institute in Mexico and was assigned the topic “Who were the Incas?” for a culture report. I remember being intrigued with the mathematical possibilities of something that sounded like a soft abacus. But I set aside my curiosity in order to focus on learning the names of all the Inca leaders—names that all seemed to have way too many letters. So now, all these years later, I was very interested in the ATA Textile Talk, “Written in Knots: What We Know Today About Khipus,” presented by Juan Antonio Murro, the curator for pre-Columbian art … Read More
Peruvian Doubleweave: Past, Present, and Future
Renowned weaver and ATA board member Jennifer Moore fell in love with doubleweave soon after her first weaving class in college. She was intrigued by being able to weave two separate layers of cloth at the same time, and most especially the possibility of creating design by interchanging the layers, a technique called doubleweave pick-up. As she explored this versatile weave structure over many years, she encountered the doublewoven designs of the pre-Columbian cultures of the Andes. Duality and complementarity (the balanced interchange of dual elements) are core concepts in the indigenous Andean worldview. From pre-Columbian and Inca cultures to today’s indigenous communities, interdependent and reciprocal relationships have always been central to Andean life. For example, since the COVID outbreak … Read More