AVANT GARDENER
(Part II)
Last week, I talked about textile conservationist and cultural advocate Raffy Tesoro’s bid to revive Philippine muslin, more commonly known as kulambo, the fabric used as mosquito netting before plastic became de rigeur, and how for this revitalization to happen, training weavers on the lost art of muslin making should be done parallel to the cultivation of Philippine cotton, which has also died out.
Tesoro enumerated the current challenges faced by folks who want to bring back both Philippine muslin and Philippine cotton. Because the Philippines currently doesn’t grow enough cotton, nor does it have the ability to spin it to the needed thread, the project is forced to source thread abroad for now.
He also explained why it was easy for weavers to forget a traditional craft within the span of only one or two generations.
“…when government started giving our weavers set matrixes for weaving, you lost the creativity, one, and the technicals, because they’re oh, you have to use this type of thread and here is a set type of weaves, so instead of understanding each region, each location, each personality, they were just giving standardized [patterns]. That doesn’t make sense, especially when you try to create cultural products. When you’re creating a mass product, yes, but when you’re creating a cultural product, no.”
He added, “And then they said ‘use these threads,’ and at the time, this was [the] 80s, they were mostly giving [weavers] polyester, nylon, so everybody lost touch with natural fibers, and of course, we lost natural fibers because they were replaced by other crops that were deemed more profitable like tobacco at that time and sugar.
“The requirements for cotton are the same as sugar, corn, and tobacco, so of course, what got transplanted? That’s what happened, which is sad.”
There’s a bigger plan behind the revival of Philippine muslin beyond rediscovering a lost art, and that’s adding premium fabrics to the roster of premium Philippine exports.
“The reason why we’re doing this is… you want to have a return to a more sustainable premium economy. If you’re looking at how economies of scale work, we are a country that cannot compete with larger countries in terms of mass production, cost, and stuff, but we have certain advantages over other countries, and we should be playing to those strengths instead, such as unique design, high quality premium workmanship and material.”
If produced and marketed correctly, the humble kulambo might join the ranks of piña, a premium fabric only found in the Philippines.
“[If] … we’re trying to sell ourselves as premium, that means we need to fix the steps that make it worthy of the price tag.”
Re-training weavers to create a fabric some of them barely remember from their childhood isn’t easy.
“…we show them the original samples of the kulambo, then we go through a methodical process because now that the weavers of today are so used to synthetics, they don’t realize that using natural fabrics requires much less force when you’re weaving it. So there’s a lot of breakage when they weave with natural fibers…. So we had to devise techniques to literally soften the blow of the loom and teach them how to be more gentle with the weaving process. It’s still ongoing.”
Tesoro believes that there’s economic and cultural potential in developing Philippine premium textile.
“That’s what we should be selling instead of, and I’m sorry to say this, we keep pushing tribal looks.., which is not a bad thing, but if it’s the only thing we’re selling, especially to an outside market like Europe, Australia, or Japan, then they’ll look at us as quaint… but they won’t look at us as sophisticated,” Tesoro explained. “When you go beyond that like the Europeans did when they started doing tapestries and embroidery, or the Indians with muslin and the Chinese with silk, you call that high culture because the amount of technical and creative skill necessary to make that kind of product befitted the price tag.”
The push for premium isn’t new, but in the industries where it’s managed to gain a foothold, such as coffee and cacao, it’s worked well.
“We actually have that ability. We have piña. We have kulambo. We have good abaca. Why are we pushing tribal culture all the time?” Tesoro said.
“But if you walk in there with a pina barong, you look better than anybody in a suit. It’s as simple as that.”
Next week I conclude this three-part series by talking about. Tesoro’s plans with kulambo beyond mosquito netting, as well as the agricultural aspect of growing Philippine cotton.