The stars from the warm and stunning Guatemalan sky descend on this cotton placemat handwoven by the Ixbalam Ke Women Weavers. The team uses that ancestral Pic'bil embroidery technique to adorn the accessory, combining diamond-shaped motifs with a gorgeous palette of bordeaux, crimson and strawberry hues.

Product Features: 

• Dimension: 17" L x 17" W
• Weight: 0.06
• Color: Red
• Material: 100% cotton
• Made in Guatemala

Story Behind the art:
Born July 7, 1977, Amalia Gue learnt to weave when she was eight years old. Today she is the Women Weavers Ixbalam Ke. She tells us the story of how the Group came to be through her limited command of Spanish. She speaks Q'eqchi, one of the many Maya languages and also the name of this community. It is one of the co-official languages of Guatemala.

The group began to take shape in 2002, when a volunteer from the Peace Corps brought a group of tourists to visit our community, and they were fascinated by the quality and style of weaving. One of these tourists, the one that showed more interest, asked a lot of questions, like what did white represent, and why we did we weave? We could only tell her that this type of weave is representative of our region, and that it is something we have inherited from our families.

We decided to call our group Ixbalam Ke because it means Lord of the Moon, but also, splitting the words, Ix means Woman, balam means moon, and Ke means new. And so 25 women got together under this name to start on this new adventure.

This type of weave is worn on the traditional huipiles (skirts, dresses) from the Cobán area, and it is predominantly white. It is known as Pikbil de Cobán, and its woven on back strap looms. These weaves are characterized by floral or animal openwork patterns inspired by the region's wildlife.

Prior to weaving, the women treat the cotton threads with nixtamal, which is prepared with corn and lime to make the threads thicker and sturdier. Weaving a standard size shawl can take up to a week, and it is finished off by hand, braiding the fringe into elaborate patterns.

All the women in my community know how to weave. We've all grew up around looms. A girl begins to learn how to weave when she is eight years old, and she is taught little by little how to use the back strap loom when she comes home from school.

I remember the first piece I wove, it was a small napkin and I was so happy when I finished it! I remember my mom being proud of it too. In my community, when a girl finishes her first weave she takes it as an offering and places it on the altar of the Church of the Calvary, so she may be blessed as a weaver for the many years and weaves to come.

In 2004 we formalized our legal status as a Group, but we really didn't know much about anything. We hadn't studied, we didn't know what quality meant. We had never worried about the dimensions of a certain piece because the only thing we had ever woven were our own huipiles to wear, and so everyone's size was different. That same year we managed to obtain a special training program from a government institution, and they taught us all about high quality and about shawls, scarves, napkins and placemats, and the dimensions for each one.

The handmade touch of artisan skill creates variations in color, size and design. If buying two of the same item, slight differences should be expected. Note: Color discrepancies may occur between this product and your computer screen.

Imported