28/02/12

Fabric of the Week: Ashanti

Lately, I’ve noticed lots of Ashanti fabric in action - as a “Modern Tribal” fabric pick in House Beautiful, as gorgeous pillows by Malcolm Kutner, and on elegant dining room chairs in a San Diego project by Walter Nelson.

Our Ashanti pattern is a “Sharply delineated design evolved from African tribal symbols,” according to our handy sample cards. One can certainly see the African folk influence in the patchwork design of geometric shapes, but from where did the name “Ashanti” derive?

The Ashanti, or Asante, people are from Ghana, on the western coast of Africa. The Ashanti tribe practices a variety of arts, from wood carving to metal casting, but they are known mostly for their weaving, particularly of a special cloth called kente. The term is rooted in the word “kenten,” or basket. The first kente weavers used raffia fibers to weave kenten-like cloth, which were referred to as “kenten ntoma,” or basket cloth.

Kente weaving dates back to the 17th Century, but legend has it that it originates from two friends, who stumbled upon a spider in the forest. They learned to weave by watching the spider spin its web. Sounds tedious, but it paid off! The pair improved upon the technique and showed a piece they wove out of raffia palm to the Ashanti Chief, who adopted it as a royal cloth for very important social and religious ceremonies. Today kente is still present at special occasions, perhaps as gifts for puberty or marriage rites, or as a symbol of reverence during ancestor worship. It is also commonly worn at community celebrations to display prestige and merriment.

Kente serves as a visual representation of the Ashanti people’s history, culture, political thought, and religious beliefs. Both color and pattern are essential to the symbolism - and, of course, the aesthetic effect - of kente. Yellow, for example, may be associated with the yoke of an egg or with the mineral gold, representing fertility, royalty, and wealth.

Though our fabric is named for the Ashanti tribe, other Ghanaian ethnic groups, such as Bono, Fante, and Nzema, also make kente.

From Italy to Ghana, Fortuny represents a rich global history of fashion and textiles!