DETAILS:

The Cinnabar accent pillow is a unique pillow made with traditional handwoven fabric from Peru, Hmong cross stitch embroidery embellished with ribbon from Vietnam, and a colorful handwoven gradient fabric from India with surface weave highlights. This one-of-a-kind pillow will highlight any room in the house.

• 19” x 19”

• Front – cotton and polyester blend

• Back – linen, in harvest gold

• Zipper closure

• Down duck feather pillow insert

• Fabric origins: Peru, Vietnam and India

THE STORY:

I like the combination of fabrics in this pillow and the radiant color palette. The vertical stripe textiles on each side nicely frame the traditional Hmong cross stitch fabric in the center.

On the left is a beautiful example of finely woven cloth from Peru. Peruvian textiles are full of bright colors as they are an important part of the Andean aesthetic. Their traditional fabrics use multiple shades of one color to form a gradation of small stripes within that color palette and then mix in other colorful stripes to form a radiant cloth known as Aguayo fabric, which women often use to wrap and carry babies on their back. Opposite is a handwoven fabric from India which features a surface weave pattern. The placement of the stripes suggest a sunset and balance well with the Peruvian fabric.

The center section of the pillow is made from a small section of an accordion pleated traditional Hmong skirt from Vietnam. The orange embroidery is done in a fine cross stitch in shades of orange with white “flower” stitching and green accent embroidery. For embellishment, thin strips of purchased fabric and metallic ribbon are appliqued joining the embroidery to the batik indigo fabric. I have several of these traditional skirts acquired during visits to Craft Link, a fair trade organization who supports ethnic minority groups and traditional craft producers to revive and promote traditional culture and skills through handicraft production. Craft Link is located in Hanoi. Six times I have visited Vietnam but not once did I have the opportunity to visit any of the Hill Tribes in the northern part of Vietnam which is unfortunate because the textiles made by the Hill Tribes are notably some of my favorites.