”Sarashi-Momen / bleached cotton muslin”

 

Object: Sarashi-Momen / bleached cotton muslin, Kohaba (narrow width), machine woven with selvedge.

Description:

Cotton came to Japan in 799 from India, but cotton production expanded during the Edo period (1603-1868) at first. Many regions in Japan became known for cotton production and the woven fabric, that continue even today. Sarashi-Momen usually weaves in a narrow width (widest about 50cm), and then goes through the Sarashi /bleaching process wherefrom that name came.

Sarashi is a process for removing impurities in woven fabrics. A Japanese bleaching method / Wa-sarashi based on that the fabrics are put in water and boiled slowly for two or three days. There are factories still using the traditional method, but most have switched to bleaching with chemicals today.

There are also still factories using old shuttle power looms from the Meiji period (1868 -1912) and weaves narrow width with the selvedge. There are several woven qualities in Sarashi-Momen.

This woven quality, slightly sparse and soft, is for Yukata /summer wear, Tenugui /hand towel etc..

Material: cotton

Technique: plain/tabby woven

Dimension: 32,5cm(W) x 920cm (L)

Density: warp 18 threads x weft 17 threads /cm (unwashed)

Place of origin: Japan

Location: private

Other info:

Sarashi – Japanese-wiki-corpus

https://japanese-wiki-corpus.github.io/culture/Sarashi.html