The back of an indigo boro quilt from Japan, held together with sashiko; its makers aren't recorded. Photo Karl Zetterström, Statens museer för världskultur, CC BY 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons.
Sashiko
What it took directly
- documentedIssey Miyake's first collection (end of 1970) took from sashiko quilting, for a pair of culotte trousers"Taken from Miyake’s first collection, which was presented at the end of 1970, these culotte-style trousers are based on the traditional Japanese technique of “sashiko” quilting" Victoria and Albert Museum, collection record O1775093
- documentedDavid Bowie's Ziggy Stardust-era daywear took from Issey Miyake's early pieces, including those sashiko-quilted culottes"Bowie owned a number of early Issey Miyake pieces, which were worn by either Bowie or members of his entourage as daywear during the Ziggy Stardust era." Victoria and Albert Museum, collection record O1775093 (David Bowie Archive)
- documentedThe sashiko-quilted firefighter's jacket (hikeshi-banten) comes from Edo's townsmen fire brigades, created in 1720"The capital of Edo (now Tokyo) was ravaged on a number of occasions and in 1720 a system of townsmen firefighters (machibikeshi) was created to protect the dwellings and lives of the city’s ordinary populace." Victoria and Albert Museum, collection record O1803042
- documentedVisible mending comes from sashiko, in the telling of knitwear designer Flora Collingswood-Norris"Collingswood-Norris traces the history of visible mending to sashiko, a form of Japanese stitching that's been around for centuries." Debbie Elliott, NPR Weekend Edition (March 2022)
What it learned to do
- statedSashiko learned from hiding the repair: stitching life into the cloth so the mend disappears"Sashiko is the practice to add some life into the fabric to hide the fact that they had to stitch." Atsushi Futatsuya, sashiko artisan, to NPR (2022)
- statedAtsushi Futatsuya, sashiko artisan answered visible mending's claim on sashiko"Yes, sashiko can be a form of visible mending, but it is more like invisible mending." Atsushi Futatsuya, sashiko artisan, to NPR (2022)
- documentedSashiko learned from work clothes: layers of cotton sewn together for warmth and wear"This method of sewing layers of cotton fabric together was used to make work clothes warmer and more durable." Victoria and Albert Museum, collection record O24578
- documentedSashiko's decorative bands learned from where the sledge straps rubbed: the same stitching reinforces and decorates"This sleeveless jacket was designed to be worn when hauling sledges. The diagonal band quilted with white thread is both decorative and practical, reinforcing the fabric against the rubbing of the sledge straps." Victoria and Albert Museum, collection record O24578
- documentedThe firefighter's jacket learned from sashiko's thick, quilted layers of cotton"Firefighters wore jackets (hikeshi-banten) made from several layers of thick cotton quilted together with sashiko stitching, along with hood, trousers and gloves." Victoria and Albert Museum, collection record O1803042
The tradition it sits in
- documentedSashiko comes from cotton's arrival in rural Japan, which became folk textiles: sakiori, sashiko, kogin and boro"High demands led to cotton’s transformation into regional folk textile traditions such as sakiori, rag weaving; sashiko and kogin, stitching or quilting combined with bast fibers, as well as vernacular boro." Yoshiko Iwamoto Wada, Textile Society of America Symposium (2004)
- documentedBoro bedding mended with sashiko took from cotton rags shipped up the coast on the Kitamaesen route"mostly recycled from cotton clothing and other castaway rags brought via the “Kitamaesen,” a commercial shipping route servicing the northern sea coast" Yoshiko Iwamoto Wada, Textile Society of America Symposium (2004)
- inferredThe patched look of today's visible mending comes from boro, the patched-and-pieced rag textiles, more than from sashiko stitching itself"this paper assesses how such extensively repaired, patched, and pieced utilitarian textiles" inferred — Wada describes boro as extensively repaired, patched and pieced, and Futatsuya says sashiko hides its repairs; no source draws this line
Where the whole form comes from
- statedSashiko comes from people who could not afford to replace their cloth"If they were wealthy enough to be able to replace the fabric, they wouldn't probably have to stitch." Atsushi Futatsuya, sashiko artisan, to NPR (2022)
- documentedJapan's cotton comes from China, and was firmly established in Japan's warmer regions by the 18th century"By way of China, cotton cultivation was brought to Japan. By the eighteenth century it was firmly established in the country’s warmer regions" Yoshiko Iwamoto Wada, Textile Society of America Symposium (2004)
- documentedSashiko comes from the 8th century, by the V&A's account"based on the traditional Japanese technique of “sashiko” quilting, which first appeared in the 8th century." Victoria and Albert Museum, collection record O1775093
- statedMending comes from as long as people have worn clothes"Mending has been around since people started wearing clothes. And I'm hoping that now we're just kind of getting back to our roots." Rebecca Harrison, founder of Old Flame Mending, Pittsburgh, to NPR (2022)
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