I’ve always been interested in textiles and fabrics and in the different techniques employed to make specific materials.
The silk industry, for example, fascinates me, though, being Italian, what I know about silk production mainly refers to the Como area, a very important silk district.
It was therefore a big surprise for me to discover a little museum in Stockholm dedicated to silk processing in Sweden and also be able to admire 170-year-old looms.
The museum is called K.A. Almgren Sidenväveri and its located in the Södermalm area.
This was a silk processing factory in the past, but it closed down in 1974 and was later on reopened as a working museum in 1991 by a fifth-generation member of the family.
Once you step over the main door you will find yourself in a small office room that features large windows and quite a few shelves stacked with old registers containing little pieces of ribbons for medals or freemasonry decorations from the 1800s, in the most wonderful colours, from bright blue and vivid yellow to wonderful nuances of pink, red and turquoise or characterised by beautiful weaving patterns.
Little cards with orders for different ribbons with the measurements requested by the different clients can also be examined. Coloured threads – from pale pink to bright fuchsia, delicate blue to violet, lemongrass, orange, silver and green – are also lined up on the shelves.
The rest of the museum is divided in two larger rooms and a smaller one.
A sign in the first main room reads “vid vävstolarna” (at the machines) and introduces the visitor to the main wooden looms with perforated cardboard sheets hanging and threads being woven.
Kristofer Gegenwarth, the museum guide, explained me that, in the past, there were more women working in this industry since they were considered as cleaner than men, especially unmarried ones as they weren’t busy with house chores, so their hands were softer and therefore more suitable to handle silk threads.
The second large room features a “moirepress för tyg”, that is a press used to create the wonderful weaving pattern that characterises some ribbons, and a machine used to prepare the silk and make it stiffer with shellac coated paper.
The rather strange wheel-like machine located in the smaller room is instead a “trumma”, a machine used to comb the bobbins, while the "skärmöhl/varpa" that looks like a strange tool used to torture people, is actually a winding machine for bobbins.
In a corner of one of the rooms a jacquard machine shows the visitors how this technique, originally developed in the early 1800s, worked.
A pattern is translated to a cardboard punch card and a group of needles turn the information on the punch card to the warp thread via a hook, creating a great variety of pattern weaving.
Historically speaking this museum is obviously very important because it’s a small example of the impact the industrial revolution had on society, apart from being one of Scandinavia’s oldest preserved industrial environments and the only remaining mill north of the alps, but it’s also important on a social level since such industries employed quite a few people.
In 1837 K.A. Almgren Sidenväveri employed one foreman, 3 apprentices, 17 female weavers, 5 female sifters, 3 bobbing girls and 1 warpess.
Jenny Amalia Lindberg worked at Almgrens from 1904 to 1944. She made ribbons and head scarves, both simple ones (on plain looms) and more elaborate ones that featured floral motifs (on jacquard looms). She had to weave 28 scarves to earn 10 SEK. Workers slowly but relentlessly declined in 1934.
While walking around these rooms you get the impression that the only thing missing is probably the noise of the machines working and the hustle and bustle of the factory environment.
If you want to understand better how the machines worked you can head upstairs and watch a video about the factory and follow the vicissitudes of Knut August Almgren who stole the technology for this former silk-weaving factory back in the late 1820s while recovering from tuberculosis in France.
On this floor you will also be able to see more pieces of textiles, admire ceremonial sashes, ribbons and silk scarves and portraits, learn the legend about the discovery of silk (an empress sat under a mulberry tree drinking tea when a butterfly cocoon fell into her cup unravelling a thread) and discover further notions on the history of silk weaving in Sweden (silk was first imported to Sweden and, from 1649, it was produced locally in a weaving mill owned by a Dutchman).
Though I haven’t become an expert in Swedish mills, silk and fabrics, I think I have definitely learnt more about such things by visiting this museum and at least now I definitely know the difference between the words "siden" (fabric) and "silke" (silk thread).
Special thanks to K.A. Almgren Sidenväveri guide Kristofer Gegenwarth for providing further information on the museum and helping with my translation needs.
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