Donegal Tweed

Donegal Tweed July 23, 2017

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In county Donegal one can still find the traditional old process of weaving on a loom. Most such products today (including Edinburgh Woolen Mill stuff in various cases) are not made where they were traditionally made, and are not hand made any more. Indeed, much of it is made in China! Not so the stuff from Triona. We went to a demonstration of the traditional craft by master weaver Dennis Traherne. You will notice as well they have included the original Traherne cottage in the shop, to show you what life used to be like in Ireland. It is instructive.

First of all, a glimpse at the beautiful finished product— sweaters, scarves etc.
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One of the things that makes Triona special, is the ability to weave not just using black and white threads but to integrate in colored threads as well. Most weaver cannot do this elaborate sort of weaving. Here are some picture of Denny at work and explaining what he is doing, but first a lass will play us a jig on the fiddle!
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And how did all this originalte, well let’s take a little visit inside the old cottage. trio10trio11trio12trio13

A little sermonizing is in order about Americans and their lust for cheap goods. We are killing off all the mom and pop, made by hand industries. You do indeed get what you pay for. If you want a handmade sweater, for example, then you must be prepared to pay a fair wage to the weaver, pay for the materials and pay to receive it if you don’t buy it at the shop. It takes something like 40 hours+ of work to put together a produce like the following: trio15 Never mind something like this—
trio16 For the latter, you should expect to pay several hundred dollars. I’m just saying.


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