... Back From The Hindu Kush

I had a wonderful time! It was very exciting to visit Garam Cheshma the village, high in the mountains on the border between Pakistan and Afghanistan where shu is made. The setting was exquisitely beautiful and the people involved in making shu were at once dignified and also very helpful to me. To witness the spinning and weaving processes was something else, the machines used could have been plucked from a scene hundreds of years ago. It would be wrong to understand them as primitive though, they were obviously efficient and ergonomic. The skill involved in using them was impressive and I now have a much better understanding of the labour which goes into the fabric.

I have pasted some screen captures from the film I took at Garam Cheshma below.

Off to the Hindu Kush!

I apologise for the lack of posts over the past couple of weeks, but my spare time has been taken up with organising a trip to Pakistan. I leave on Friday and I am back on the 20th. Whilst out there I hope to film, photograph and interview the wonderful makers of shu!

I also want to visit these people for their famous Spring festival...

...and visit these people on their high altitude wanderings.

...and perhaps squeeze in a couple of days in this celestial valley!

Top photograph curtsey of Matan Rochlitz.

The Kailey Sheep

The wool we use comes from a sheep called the kailey. I don't know as much as I should do about this sheep and what I do know may be a bit iffy. But, I think it is unique to Chitral and it is interesting to environmentalists as it doesn't graze the high pastures since grazing the upper slopes of the Hindu Kush contributes to erosion and flash floods. It still gets succulent fodder from the high pastures though, as shepherds make the climb instead of their flocks and lovingly bring back sack loads of scythed grass for the waiting sheep. It must be worth it as the wool is very much prized and costs a lot more than comparable mountain wools.

As a tribute to this fine sheep and because I need something to print on to T-shirts I made a drawing of the Kailey....

Heavy Snow in the Hills

I got a text from a friend in Chitral earlier this week reporting four to five feet of snowfall.  When the snow gets this deep there is not much you can do except muck about in it. In the Kalasha Valleys clan lines up against clan to play the came of 'chitk gal' a sort of turbo-golf, where the ball keeps on getting lost in the snow, fights break out and the losers have to kill an oxen to feed the winners.

 

Images with kind permission of Matan Rochlitz.

More Maps

I have finished a map for the booklet which I plan to accompany each item of Hindu Kush clothing sold. It shows where the wool is produced in respect to South Asia and the Hindu Kush mountain range. I have posted before about Tirich Mir and Chitral.

Map of Chitral Lining

After the floral exuberance of my previous lining, I have been experimenting with a more prosaic lining. My new lining takes the highest peaks and passes of Chitral and lays them out in a design which is reminiscent of a star chart. I have produced a dark and a pale version...

A New Lining

Over the weekend I have been working on a waistcoat lining. The design is not quite finished, but the drawing is, so I have posted it below. As you can see I have gone for a Mughal style composition squashed into the form of a Paisley pattern. So far so good, but if you look closer you will see that I have subverted it with all sorts of computer cables, satellite dishes and -perhaps too obviously- an ipad. What I am trying to get across is rather contradictory: The story behind the wool I use and the imagery in my linings and labels, focuses on a romantic ideal of the Hindu Kush: high mountains, rugged hospitable people and timeless, pre industrial crafts. All this is true, but I am only able to bring it together and sell it to a Western market because of communications technology. People in Chitral may lead lives steeped in tradition, but they also text and tweet and send facebook messages, that's how I can do business with them from the other side of the world.

With some colour added...

Tirich Mir

At 7,708 meters Tirich Mir is the highest mountain in the Hindu Kush range, the highest mountain outside the Himalayan-Karakoram range and the 33rd highest mountain in the world. In my previous post I explained how our wool is made at its feet.

Independent of its height Tirich Mir is remarkable for lots of different reasons. Firstly it dominates the Chitral valley in the most awe-inspiring way. As you fly into the tiny Chitral airport Tirch Mir floats high above the aircraft, a blinding-white chunk of land, which seems out of place so deep into the sky. Once on the ground the mountain is inescapable, a constant presence, far to the West, but appearing deceptively close due to its scale and brilliance.

The human story of Tirich Mir is beguiling too: first climbed in 1950 by the Norwegian mountaineer turned eco-philosopher Arne Naess, the mountain has played its part in the environmental movement of the twentieth century. Before Naess people in Chitral had imagined presences on summit of Tirich Mir, djinns (demons) were said to haunt its slopes. More profoundly though, the summit was understood to be the meeting place of mountain top fairies. These fairies played and still play an important role in the pre-Islamic religions of the region, guarding the purest places, beyond the polluting reach of man.

Tirich Mir from theworldmountain.blogspot.co.uk

Tirich Mir looming over Chitral valley. From Zerega at www.panoramio.com.

Tirich Mir from Shahi Masjid in Chitral town. 

A Woodcut of Tirich Mir

The wool for our garments is spun in the shadow of Tirich Mir, the Highest mountain in the Hindu Kush. It is washed in streams fed by the mountain's glaciers and the sheep which provide it graze the mountain's foot hills. Therefore I thought it was important that an image of Tirich Mir was somehow incorporated into our first collection, so I engraved a woodcut of the mountain as seen from the south. The woodcut was then printed onto paper using the burnish technique and finally digitally printed onto cotton. The printed cotton image will be sewn onto the inside of the second jacket in the collection.

The wood cut in progress: I used an engraving tool and a knife brought in Chitral, North West Pakistan.

The wood block after being inked.

Printed onto fabric.

Kalasha Style

The most iconic garments from Chitral are the heavily embroidered dresses of Kalasha women. The Kalasha are a minority within Chitral, non Muslims who live in three small valleys on the border with Afghanistan. Their religion which includes elements of animism and polytheism, but which acknowledges one god, was once practiced across the Hindu Kush, but now is limited to 3,000 or so adherents.

The Kalasha's unique religion, their beautiful valleys, their distinctive costume and certain practices like wine making and solstice festivals have long made them popular with scholars and more recently; tourists. Throughout Pakistan and abroad the Kalasha have come to be symbolised by the striking dresses worn by their women. These dresses start off life as a baggy black cotton shirt, which is then personalised with bright wool embroidery around the hems and collar. Interestingly these dresses are a recent innovation. Traditionally Kalasha women wore brown-black homespun woolen dresses, globalization and the introduction of a monetary economy to the region have provided women with access to cheap cotton and dyed wool from China. Ironically enough it is the availability of mass produced products which has given Kalasha women a new means to express their individuality.

The photos below are of our friends or their relatives in Kraka village (2011).

Photos reproduced with kind permission of Matan Rochlitz.

Our Second Jacket Finished

Like our first jacket our second jacket takes the elegant cut of a traditional Englishman's suit jacket and sets it against our star material: the famous shu wool of the Hindu Kush mountains. Shu is prized for its insulating properties, it's thick, but also lightweight and it's hard wearing as well as being soft to touch. As a nod to the traditional garments of the Hindu Kush we have done away with Western lapels and given our jacket a clean shawl collar, which unlike the first jacket is designed to be worn down. A small horn button is at the ready to fasten the collar, whilst leaving enough space to tuck a scarf in, for extra warmth and to protect the wearer's neck from the jacket's wool.  The collar is backed with durable, but flexible kaki moleskin. The coat is finished with patch pockets, three horn buttons and a sweeping hem ending in a single vent tail.

The Wool

Our wool is unique to the Hindu Kush. Shu, as the wool is known locally has been developed over generations to insulate against freezing temperatures and biting winds. It is thick and spongy, providing the wearer with maximum insulation whilst remaining light and flexible. Shu also has a felted finish which lends it a factor of wind proofing that comparable wools can’t match.

Shu is produced household by household using techniques which have not changed in centuries. No part of the shu manufacture process is mechanized, this means that shu is a handmade fabric in the truest sense of the term. The density of weave and thickness of felting vary subtly from household to household, leaving us with a product that bears the signatures of the artisans who made it.

Shubinak, our partner in Pakistan is partially owned by the artisans who make shu, ensuring that profit from the sale of their crafts finds its way back into the community.

Shu is made in settlements at the foot of Tirich Mir (7,700 m), the highest mountain in the Hindu Kush.  The production of the fabric is intimately linked to the mountains. Shepherds gather by hand the choicest fodder for their flocks from high altitude pastures, which are only revealed at the melting of the winter snow. Spring melt waters feed the streams in which shu is washed and felting happens in naturally occurring hot springs overlooked by Tirich Mir. For images of the production of shu please see www.shubinak.com.

Shu is made in nine laborious stages: first the sheep is washed and then sheared by hand. The wool is then treated with a locally occurring fine white soil to remove moisture and grease. Next a bow is vibrated over the wool to separate the fibers ready for teasing and then spinning. The spun yarn is then woven into fabric which is felted, stretched and hung out in the sun to dry.

In Chitral shu is generally woven into three items of clothing, the pakol, the patu and the shu-coat, all sported by the man above. The pakol is the distinctive cap worn by the peoples of the Hindu Kush, the patu is a blanket which is worn like a shawl in winter and the shu-coat is a long button-less, loose-cut overcoat.

Images to be reproduced only with the permission on Hindu Kush ltd.

Chitral Style

Winters in Chitral are brutal, the landscape is very rugged and infrastructure is poor so people in Chitral tend to dress practically. Traditionally Chitralis wore felted wool garments, a topic which deserves several posts of its own. Today Chitralis still wear a lot of locally made wool, but in the bazaar you can get practically anything (the best I saw was a London Underground hi-vis vest which the seller told me came from Kabul). So de rigueur in Chitral tends to be a fantastic mix of the traditional and the global...

A man of the Wakhi people at the Baroghil polo festival... note his handmade mallet, his maroon cardigan and the matching scarf around his waist. 

Psychedelic cardigan and shell-suit top at the same polo festival. The yak nearly got me.

     NFL team Oakland Raiders jacket as sported by a Guja nomad on his way to the same festival.

Yark, the man who owned more yaks than anyone else at Baroghil. Unfortunately I didn't get a photo of Yark, but he did deign to sit for me. Yark being a traditionalist and a man of importance wore tweeds, which are called "tweeds" in the Wakhi language. Some of his buttons were old brass shackle types from British army uniforms. His aviators and turban left me in little doubt as to who was the boss. 

Images to reproduced only with the permission of Hindu Kush Ltd.

North West Pakistan

The idea for Hindu Kush came after many trips to a small, but super spectacular  valley in North West Pakistan called Chitral. I went first as a tourist, then as an anthropologist and film maker and finally as a businessman. I wasn't looking for business opportunities, but the quality of the woolen garments people were wearing out there and the embroidery on them got me really excited. Pretty quickly I found a supplier in Shubinak, a Pakistani company which works with and is partially owned by artisans in Chitral and now I am on the verge of launching a new label: Hindu Kush.

Image to reproduced only with the permission of Hindu Kush Ltd.