Raffia Field Trip

In February I went with my class to a local shop to see how raffia is used to create things like shoes, place mats, purses, bags, and lampshades. It was led by the man in the shot and he owns the "shop". They first showed us the raffia plant and how they strip it to make the raw raffia. It is then dried for a few hours and dyed different colors--natural dyes from other plants. The shot on the left shows how they set the loom up to begin with and the shot on the right is the actual loom. It can be adjusted to different sizes in length, but not necessarily different shapes.