Marrakesh Express
Women Weavers OnLine
N'kob
These are the Oukrim sisters, skilled weavers who made the five rugs below. Sometimes two work on a rug and sometimes all three of them. Khadija is the eldest and divorced, and Fatima is the youngest, who I think is in the center. They give the money from the rugs to their father, who uses it for household expenses.
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Piece 2.11442 is an old-style piece called a chedwi. There is a whole page of them later, but this piece is here because it is smaller than the others and would fit better in most homes. Chedwis are mostly black and white, with plain flatweave plus a special technique called twining, which you see where the white and black yarn are interwoven. This is only 10 or 15 years old, but the colors near the center are natural dye, another characteristic of chedwis. The difficulty in finding the plants for the natural dyes, and the fine weaving, make these pieces expensive. Click on the photo to really appreciate this piece, and here to see the detail. The colors are a brown-maroon and a teal blue. It measures about 4'8" square and costs $660.
Piece 2.11437 is an akhnif, a flatweave with embroidery, but in addition it has pile bordering the squares. You can see it in this detail. Because of the size and the detail, it took the three sisters working together four months to complete. The colors are a rich dark red, plus blue and green with white and orange accents. Notice how the red squares are in diagonals, and the blue ones at the ends and the green near the center, and how the designs in the center of each square are symmetrical. It measures 5'4" x 8'10" and the price is $950.
Piece 2.11446 is an akhnif, also called locally bou tilwa, with flatweave squares separated by lines of pile. Tilwa is related to the Arabic luha, which means a picture or painting, and probably derives from the squares. The colors are a rich red, blue, and forest green, with black, white and orange accents. You can see that this has a lot of detail work, especially on the close-up. You can see woven and embroidered designs in the squares there (upper left and lower right), and pile inside the squares too (upper right and lower left). It took the three sisters three months to complete this piece. The size is 5'3" x 8'8" and it costs $890.
