Whole 12-Yard BOLT of Vintage Rustic Japanese Meisen Silk in Hand-Basted Araihari Form #370

This is a bolt of Araihari Meisen kimono silk, meaning it is a kimono that has been deconstructed for cleaning. It's a window into the life of a kimono in Japan, in the past. 

Back in the day, the kimono cleaning company would carefully dis-assemble your kimono to its original 8 rectangular pieces. The pieces would be hand basted back into its original bolt of about 12 yards, 13" wide, like a puzzle. That's what this bolt is. At first glance it seems like a typical bolt of kimono silk, until you notice the basting stitches in several areas.  It's actually eight rectangles basted together to make a bolt. It also has lots of notches on the edges. It is ready for cleaning. After cleaning it would have been taken apart and re-sewn back into the owner's kimono for wearing. 

We think this mustardy-brown silk Meisen ikat was probably handwoven, sometime between 1940's-60's.  It's classic soft, lightweight, cottony-feeling, blurred-edges Meisen. It has a slight sheen and is the same on both sides. If you want to make a true kimono, some of the work is done for you, but you'll have to take out the basting of course, and we don't know what size kimono it would make. An internet search should yield traditional kimono-making instructions or videos, possibly in Japanese however.

Order "1" for the 13" wide, 12-yards long Araihari bolt. If taken apart you'd have two pieces 13" x 56", two pieces 13" x 108", two pieces 6.5" x 49", one piece 6.5" x 30", and one piece 6.5" x 70". So, quite a bit of fabric with no seams at all.