Fabric shopping trip, no more working for a week or two…..

oh hang on that was a summer holiday visiting family wasn’t it, not a shopping trip?

I have a rather simple holiday philosophy and that it to support the local economy at your destination point – and not just the regular touristy businesses – the proper local businesses as well.  So with this firmly in mind I was determined to check out some local fabrics while on our South African “visiting family” holiday.

Of course we first needed to at least be a little “touristy” and check out the local scenery so went for a drive along what is known as the Garden Route.  Think Great Ocean Road but on a different continent.

Of course the little person of the trip wanted to see the local wildlife so we headed to the Knysna Elephant Park and the  Tenikwa Wildlife Rehabilitation Centre

This little lad is about 18mths old and bought to the park as an orphan, as are all the others at the park.

The juvenile cheetah saw missmagic and decided she was about the right size for dinner!                                                                                                     Fortunately the staff don’t allow children in the enclosures so there was a 10ft high fence between them when this one decided to stalk her!

We stopped at a small tourist outlet just outside Pletternbeg Bay and to my delight found The Weaving Museum .

It isn’t really a museum by my definition as the 2 looms are still in full working order producing cloth that is made primarily into table linen.  If you ever get the chance to buy some Mungo linen I highly recommend it.  It has a fabulous feel in the hand.

However the real aim was to source some other locally made fabrics.  Unlike Australia which has very few textile mills, South Africa still has some in existence. Da Garma Textiles was the main target on my list as they produce Three Cats or ShweShwe fabric and a dear friend had asked me to track some down for her.

The first stop produced a store about the size of your average Spotlight but without the bedding, curtain and craft section – all fabrics, tables and tables and more tables of them!   Curtain fabric, upholstery fabric, craft fabric, trims, notions, silks, knits – oh my where to start?  Fortunately there were far more staff than what you get in your average Australian fabric store and once I worked out that there was one place to get your fabric cut and then another counter to pay all was good.  Fun as it was, this didn’t produce a great deal of luck as it was mostly imported fabrics, none of which had fibre content labels!

However  missmagic discovered some yellow animal print – they had it in pink but no she wanted yellow and please can I have pants, a top and a dress made from it – and then added some lime green jersey to the mix.   The hot pink in the middle is one I picked up as its a jersey but has a slub like a raw silk – no idea on fibre content.  I will have to get out the matches and do a burn test on it and let you know.

We then headed to a quilting store, much like a quilting store at home with Michael Miller and similar US brands. 

But tucked in the back corner was some Inkwali fabrics.  These are all dyed and printed my local women in Cape Town.

After explaining to the helpful staff that we were looking for traditional / local fabrics they directed us to a shop at The Observatory – another suburb of Cape Town and all my ShweShwe fabric needs as well as other eastern and southern african fabric needs were met.

The odd thing about this fabric is that is it sold unwashed, so contains the printing and fabric finishing residue which leaves it with odd kind of dried glue and very stiff finish.

This is a piece that is about 50cm square, was folded in the suitcase to come home and I literally unfolded it a bit and stood it up – no props needed!

If you are interested in ShweShwe fabrics then check out DaGarma Textiles and the She Wears ShweShwe Blog

Of course on the last night we were there my husbands cousin visited and bought me a little bag of fabric, saying “I’m sure you’ve been to Biggie Best already but I ducked out in my lunch hour today and got you a few remnants and offcuts, not much but would be nice as a trim on denim”.  Hmmm no, no-one mentioned Biggie Best so I guess thats a good enough reason to come back for another visit/shopping trip!

There were a few other fabric finds along the way, but I need to keep some surprises for later.

Cheers, M