We’re lucky that there’s still a nearby local village that has preserved it’s weaving culture by establishing a guild of traditional Thai weavers who’ve passed on the skills as well as the traditional patterns.  In the seven years we’ve been visiting this village they’ve upgraded the guild’s presence, workshop, museum and “exit thru the gift shop” area.

This year there were far more weavers at work than we’ve seen in the past.  There’s always been a long warp and weaving project on each of the more than twenty ancient looms, however this time they had 10 or more ladies working on their looms, weaving with flying shuttles, winding thread on to shuttles, threading heddles and all the aspects of the weaving process.

The upstairs museum had been renovated recently with larger, more detailed displays and best of all was a video with English subtitles explaining the history of weaving in Trang Province and this particular guild of weavers. We’ve  toured the museum several times in past visits, but this time learned on the video that before rice became ubiquitous and more profitable in this region, cotton was grown in those fields.

Also it was clearer that a woman would not just weave every-day clothing for the family, but it was traditional that all the elaborate wedding garb was custom-woven for each of their children.

Due to the recent passing of their long-reigning king, many of the loom’s really long warps and projects held all-black fabric or black and white patterns because the country is in a year-long period of mourning.  So there wasn’t much in the way of colorful cotton fabric to purchase.