mthaitan@andrew.cmu.edu – Page 2 – 62-150A: Introduction to Textile Media

Textile Traditions – Vietnamese Traditional Dress

The textile tradition that I chose to talk about was the traditional dress in Vietnamese culture. The traditional dress for women was the female version of the ao dai (pronounced like ow-ee-yai) which is typically a silk tunic that flows down to the ankles and white silk trousers or a long skirt underneath, depending on which region of Vietnam. In the past, the color of the ao dai often reflected class and status. For example, those of the upper class often had gold details and royalty often had intricate gold embroidery of dragons.

Vietnam - Traveler view | Travelers' Health | CDC

The origin of ao dais is said to be in Hanoi, the capital of Vietnam, but no one knows when it really sprouted its roots. There has been a lot of evolution of the style of ao dais as is laid out in the video below. The first clear evidence of the ao dai was in the late 1700s, in the North, the northern lords of Hanoi forced subjects to wear ao giao linh (ow-yow-lin), which was essentially a front buttoned gown and skirt. In the South, members were demanded to wear gowns and trousers. Later we saw the northern version begin to evolve into the current image of the ao dai by shifting to differentiate between social classes. In the early/mid 20th century, when French colonization took over in Vietnam, Hanoian artist, Cat Tuong varied the ao dai into many different silhouettes, taking inspiration from Western fashion. Many of the designs were considered too scandalous for traditional Vietnamese culture, so the ao dai evolved to be made of 2 flaps, tight to the body, and closed at the neck. In the late 1950s when the US replaced the French occupying forces, there was a controversial fashion statement made by the wife of the President’s chief advisor that resulted in a ban on the style of ao dai. However, this created even more popularity for the ao dai, especially in Southern Vietnam when Saigon designer Dung Dakao revolutionized the dress again. In the 1980s, ao dais began to be made with lighter materials, vivid colors, patterns of plants, flowers, and geometric shapes. In the 21st century, the ao dai was worn less on a daily basis but remains as a symbol of cultural pride, grace, beauty, and creativity.

In today’s society, ao dai are most commonly seen at Vietnamese weddings, as can be seen in the third image at the top. The bride will traditionally wear red and the groom will wear either blue or red. Guests at the wedding will also wear an ao dai.

The image quality is kind of bad but here is a picture of me at my uncle’s wedding wearing an ao dai :)) I chose to research this topic because my dad’s side of the family is from Vietnam and I have been wanting to get an ao dai custom made for myself so it is very exciting to learn about the history of the ao dai. This is part of my family’s culture and it is important to learn 🙂

Mending Project – Maddie

Here is the finished product looking at the full scale of the pants. I did five separate mends on the pants. I intended for it to look like a bunch of different colorful patches around the pants. Originally, I wanted to do more decorative areas, but I found that the mending was a lot more time consuming than I thought so I didn’t have enough time to do everything I wanted. Even still, I like the way that they turned out.

Here are close up images of the five patches. The bottom two images are the newest patches that I made. For the pink one on the left, I started by using the stem stitch to make a rectangular border and then began doing the normal darning inside. I tried really hard to make sure that the warps were close enough together that once woven, it would be more opaque, but I found that the embroidery floss wasn’t quite thick enough to ever truly fill the space. For the orange patch on the right, I intended to make an abstract shape that kind of went back and forth, but as I was finishing the mending it started to look kind of like a rocket ship. I was originally planning on doing three shades of orange/yellow and going in three different directions, but I already liked the way it looked with two colors and didn’t want to spend the time adding a third color. At the end, I added the two backstitch lines to act like movement lines for the rocket ship. I think that this one looks most like a patch because it is more pictographic.

Mending in Progress – Maddie

This was the first mending that I attempted with darning. I am using an old pair of sweatpants that I haven’t worn in a while because there were some preexisting holes in them. This hole was on the side right next to the pocket so it was a little bit hard to set up the darning with the pocket hanging over slightly. I used blue and black yarn to make the blue really pop while still looking somewhat cohesive with the fabric of the pants.

This was the second hole that I had on the pants. For this one, I used embroidery floss and meant to have a sort of abstract shape, but I’m not sure how I feel about it right now. I think that I may go back later and expand this shape with the blue. I liked using the embroidery floss more than the yarn because it is thinner and easier to pull through the thick fabric which made the darning as a whole look more delicate.

This was the third hole that I experimented with. For this one, I just cut a slit in the fabric so it wasn’t as large of a hole to cover. I tried to experiment with decorative embroidery using a single color and made X’s around the slit. Then I went in and did horizontal warping across the slit. It ended up looking kind of like a zipper, then once I went through in the opposite direction, it looked kind of like a spine which gave me spooky halloween vibes :)) To finish off the decoration I did a running stitch just outside the slit and inside the X’s.

This is what the pants look like as a whole right now, the pocket mending is on the side so you can’t really see it in the image. Over the next few days, I think that I will try to make bigger darning patches for a nice visual effect and blend more bright colors in to give the pants more personality :))

Tapestry Weaving – Maddie

This is my finished tapestry weaving! I wanted to make Scotty as the main focus so I started the weaving with a few rows of the background color, then began to implement the different colors for the Scotty design. I found that it was difficult to work with 3 or 4 different balls of yarn and often confusing to make sure that each row lined up correctly and balanced each color. The Scotty part came out much better than I expected, but it isn’t perfect. Making the Scotty, I used the interlocking weft techniques to have multiple colors and make the different diagonal lines. It was especially challenging in the ears because they were so small.

After the Scotty, I experimented with doing vertical lines using the purple and red color. Then, I used the rya knots to make some fringe on the outer edges then did a few rows using the Swedish knot technique. This made an interesting texture and almost looked like a chain link. I followed up with more rya knots across the entire row and finished with a plain weave of red.

To finish at the top, I used thread to sew it closed and tied knots in bunches of five. At the bottom, I tied knots in bunches of three and then tried to do the netting knots, but I found it hard to have balanced knots and they turned out a bit long.

Tapestry Weaving – 4 inches Maddie Thai-Tang

For my tapestry weaving I am trying to make Scotty. I found it a bit challenging to work with multiple colors at once, especially colors in the middle, but I like the way that it has turned out so far. It is also a bit difficult when you run out of weft and have to start integrating a new piece because the old piece often sticks out still as can be seen in some spots above.

Coral: Fabric of the Reef, 2017-2018, Karen Dodd

Hornimam Museum, the natural history gallery

I was really drawn to this installation called Coral: Fabric of the Reef by Karen Dodd for a number of reasons. For one, I love marine life and I love art that mimics marine life, especially coral. The way she used different textiles to represent the unique textures of the coral is mesmerizing and the colors are beautiful.

This coral in particular is my favorite out of the installation. I love how you can see the intricate details and the juxtaposition of the thick and thin fabrics to mimic the textures found in corals. I couldn’t find specific information about how Karen Dodd made these works but they are truly stunning.

You can find the full gallery here: https://www.karen-dodd.com/untitled-gallery#0

Improvisational Weaving Part 3: Deeper Dive

Loom made from chopsticks, warp and weft made from “plarn” (plastic bags turned to plastic yarn)

For the deeper dive section of the Improvisational Weaving project, I decided that I wanted to continue experimenting with different materials and play with the effects of my weaving. I created a loom by taping six chopsticks together in the shape of a triangular prism. I had a lot of difficulty doing this and it didn’t turn out exactly how I pictured it but multiple factors played into that. For one, one pair of chopsticks was longer than the other two pairs, so the triangles couldn’t have equal angles. I also found it very difficult to tape the chopsticks together and some continued to slide up and down while I was weaving. I knew that I didn’t really have enough of any material in my room to weave with so I decided to use left over plastic bags to make plastic yarn, aka “plarn”. To do this, I cut the bag into strips to get thin rings, then I tied them together to have one very long ball of “plarn”. There were a few challenges I ran into using “plarn” for weaving. First, because the plastic is such a thin material, I found that the more I pulled it to increase the tension, the more it stretched and the thinner it became. This made the warp very loose and hard to keep in place. Second, I tried to warp in each plane separately and then move to the next plane, but towards the end, it was difficult to warp the material around the other sections. This made the warp very inconsistent in number of rows and distance between other rows. Finally, since the “plarn” is made from loops, it got a bit confusing trying to figure out which strands of warp to weave the weft through. I decided that I would experiment with this and did some areas where I went between the entire loop and some between the individual strands of the loop. Overall, I experimented most with the tightness of the weave, some sections were very tight and others were pretty loose. This made unique textures in the weave and left some areas more open and some more closed. The final result looked like a tent of sorts and the trash theme made me think of WALL-E 🙂