We looked at the Korean bojagi or pojagi, a traditional wrapping cloth in a previous post. As you may remember from that post, this traditionally square wrapping cloth can be made with a variety of materials, from more expensive silk to patchworked recycled pieces of fabrics.
These textiles were mainly employed to cover food, wrap gifts for weddings or in Buddhist rites, as traditional Korean folk religions believed that keeping something wrapped brought good luck.
More recently, these textiles have been recognized as a traditional art form and included in museum collections (the Museum of Korean Embroidery in Seoul boasts a collection of 1,500 bojagi textiles).
It is not so rare to maybe find a patchwork hemp bojagi like the one featured in this post, dating from the mid-to-late 20th century.
This design integrates a wide variety of coloured fabrics and includes four strings characterised by beautiful woven patterns.
But the special thing about this bojagi is the fact that, seen against the light, the sewed edges of the fabrics seem to recreate the black lines that framed the primary colours in Mondrian's signature paintings that also inspired Yves Saint Laurent's iconic 1965 Mondrian dresses (View this photo).
The bojagi is in great condition and it is currently available on the Tatami Antiques site, an independent online marketplace for Japanese antiquities that often offers intriguing textile pieces and ideas for fashion designers (the item is sold by kikue, a seller specialised in Korean antiquities).
