A Katazome Dyed Boro Futon Cover: Marvelous Patterns

$396.00 USD

**reduced from $495.00**
early twentieth century
68 1/2" x 42", 174 cm x 106.5 cm

This beautifully figured cloth is a futon cover that has been pieced from about 11 fragments of indigo dyed katazome cloth.

Two different patterns were distributed over the surface of this cloth to create the whole piece.

The cotton is a bit lightweight and in places it is threadbare: this is not uncommon for boro cloths that have been used for decades as this one no doubt was. 

The center area and left hand side are stitched from katazome cloth showing a repeat pattern of stylized chrysanthemums. On the right hand side and bottom we see cloth that shows shippo or interlocking circles, asanoha or the traditional hemp leaf pattern and cherry blossoms arranged in diagonally-oriented bands.

The soft cotton cloth has faded or oxidized a bit over the years and it now shows as a kind of blue-grey tone. There are solid indigo cotton patches that are superimposed over the base cloth thus creating an interesting visual dynamic, something good boro cloth does.

This futon cover has great age--certainly at least 100 years or more--and its arrangement of patterns in such wonderful proportion to one another make this a desirable piece.

Recommended.