Time spent with mawata in the mountain landscape.
This soft silk is part of our everyday textile practice.
Mawata is silk made by softening cocoons in hot water, removing the pupae, then opening and layering the silk into thin sheets.
At yamamayu, we carry this mawata forward into thread and cloth.
Rather than explaining mawata simply as a material,
this page is about the time spent touching it in daily life in the mountains, the knowledge held in the hands, and the relationships that grow around it.
The Mountains and Mawata
At our studio in Yamanashi, the rhythm of daily work changes with the seasons.
There is time spent raising silkworms. Time spent working with plants for dyeing.
And time spent slowly drawing thread from mawata.
Mawata is not something kept apart as a special material.
For many years, it has simply been part of the everyday work of making cloth.
Time Spent with the Hands
There is no need to hurry when working with mawata.
We first feel its softness with our fingertips, then slowly begin to draw out the thread.
As the condition of the material changes, the movement of the hands changes with it.
In our workshops as well, we value the time spent simply touching and becoming familiar with the material before trying to make something complete.
Through touch, we sometimes notice things that could not be understood by looking alone.
It is a way of learning the softness of mawata, and the feeling of thread beginning to emerge, through our own hands.
Mawata and People
Through activities with schools and children, we sometimes invite them to experience mawata with their own hands.
A cocoon is opened, and a fine thread begins to appear between the fingertips.
Rather than only hearing an explanation, touching the material directly is where a relationship with it begins.
Even when people touch the same mawata, what they feel and what they make from it will be different.
We want to value those differences,
and pass on the experience of encountering the material itself to the next generation.
From Mawata to Cloth
Mawata begins as a soft material held in the hands, then gradually becomes thread, is dyed, and is woven into cloth.
Once it becomes cloth, the form it had as mawata is no longer visible.
But in the thickness and irregularity of hand-drawn thread, and in the way it holds the light,
something of that earlier time remains.
At yamamayu, we do not want to use mawata simply as a material.
We want to value the whole process of touching it, drawing it into thread, and allowing it to become cloth.
Learn More About Mawata
This page is about mawata as it exists within everyday life at yamamayu.
For more about mawata as a material, and the process from cocoon to thread, please visit the page below.