Egypt has prominently been on the news since 2011 when the revolution erupted in Cairo's Tahrir Square. The street clashes at the beginning of July 2013 after President Morsi was deposed brought the country back on the global news. But, if you think that as a fashion fan this is none of your business and you don't really care about politics on a national or international level, well, you'd better start rethinking your position.
We do live in a globalised world so changes of governments and political revolutions taking place all over the planet have an impact on our lives as well, sometimes in unexpected ways. A while back a friend of mine complained for example about the rise in price of a basic cotton T-shirt bought at a High Street retailer. The label on that T-shirt indicated it was made in Egypt, and the unstable political situation over there explained, at least partially, one of the reasons for the price increase.
As consumers we should maybe trying to be more aware of such connections and to this purpose and to celebrate the best 100% cotton fibre in the world - Egyptian cotton - Italian yarn manufacturer Filmar released a book about The Cotton Museum of Cairo, located inside the Agricultural Museum in Ad Doqi, Giza.
Founded in 1958, the Italian company opened in 2009 the Filmar Nile Textile, a factory producing cotton of the purest quality, located at around 50 km from Alexandria.
Filmar launched the book with a small exhibition in July during the Florence-based Pitti Filati event, but it has recently made the book available on a dedicated website as well.
The volume and the site feature quite beautiful archival images in black and white about cotton planting, harvesting and manufacturing, and the accompanying texts explain the history of Egyptian cotton in an accessible way.
Egypt is indeed a leading producer in the production of long staple (Giza 86, Giza 89, Giza 90) and extra long staple (Giza 45, the "queen" of Egyptian cotton; Giza 70, Giza 87 and Giza 88) cotton.
Cotton is a shrub of the family Malvaceae native to the Indian subcontinent and the tropical and subtropical regions of Africa and the Americas, and was imported to Europe by the Arabs. The plants in the wild can reach a height of more than 1.50 m and have a long life. The wild species of cotton produce seeds covered only with reddish hairs, cultivated plants produce longer, clear, spinnable fibres.
There are nearly a thousand varieties of cotton cultivated. The main species include Gossypium herbaceum (cotton of the Levant), Gossypium hirsutum (Upland cotton), Gossypium arboreum and Gossypium barbadense (Sea Island Cotton).
Planted in late March, cotton develops in July and August and is harvested by hand in September in five consecutive stages.
The Cotton Museum of Cairo includes manuscripts and legislative decrees on cotton, paintings about its cultivation, antique embroidered fabrics and samples of Syrian and Coptic textiles dating from the 12th and the 14th centuries and collections of hand-needled embroidery of cotton on leather; models of looms, irrigation systems, carding and weaving machines; diagrams and charts indicating the varieties of Egyptian cotton catalogued between 1818 and 1949; illustrations about the structure of the cotton seed and the importance of hybridisation, samples of all botanical varieties in the world - from the extinct to the most recent.
Models and illuminated tables illustrate the cultivation methods and the spinning, weaving, dyeing and finishing processes that allow to obtain long and thin fibers of the best Egyptian cotton from freshly picked fibres in flocks.
Some sections of the museum look at the more legendary aspects of cotton that explain the fibre as the product of a plant that is half vegetable, half animal (according to the legend, the cotton wads are cute tiny sheep, attached to a plant through their umbilical cord), others also analyse more technical aspects like the transport system and the Cotton Exchange of Alexandria, where the first sale of cotton was recorded in 1865.
The volume and the website also show pictures of the rooms inside the Cotton Museum and by looking at some of the images you get the feeling you're stepping into the past: the symbolic heart of the Cotton Museum is indeed what looks like an extraordinary room documenting all the varieties of cultivated cotton. On the walls there are photographs of the botanists behind the varieties of cotton kept in glass cabinets and cases, while a valuable antique chest holds seeds, fibres and flowers divided in drawers as if the museum curators who classified them tried to find the genetic code of cotton.
The very finest cottons are kept in symbolic transparent glass pyramids and seeds of different varieties are preserved in antique glass vases that resemble Fabergé eggs, while cotton capsules lay on fluffy cotton as if they were asleep on comfortable beds.
Though visiting the museum virtually may not be as exciting and interesting as walking for real through its rooms, this new online resource is still useful to discover the history of Egyptian cotton and the more technical aspects regarding one of the most popular fibres employed for the best versatile garments in our wardrobes.
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