The Textile Atlas
Global
2017 –
Heritage textiles carry rich stories of cultural history. While many ethnic minorities don't have a written format of their languages, for generations they have been creating motifs into their costumes to tell the ancestors' stories. With the trend of people leaving their traditional textile crafts, many cultures are quickly disappearing.
Narrative Made champions sustainable practices and heritage crafts and believes in order for artisanal businesses to be sustainable, they need to have the resources and networking platforms to promote such practices.
In 2017, we launched The Textile Atlas, an online resource platform promoting disappearing Asian textile crafts in commercial, academic and public arenas. The Textile Atlas is a response to the fast-disappearing relationship between design and culture. It preserves a record of traditional textiles, maker's profiles, creative processes, and cultural stories from 20+ countries.
The platform is the first of its kind to map out artisans across the Asia region, giving access to international designers who wish to create social impact. Its featured stories are grounded by field trips and thorough research from a network of specialists, sharing years of expert knowledge on topics such as design enterprise, heritage preservation, sustainable production, poverty alleviation, and social development.
Since its launch, The Textile Atlas has been awarded the Design For Asia Grand Award 2018 and Grand Award for Culture 2018. It has been listed as resource platform by the British Council, the Oriental Rugs and Textile Society, ASEFCulture360, and featured on international publications including WGSN, Design Anthology, Evoked and more. The platform has connected dozens of designers, craftsmen, collectors, curators, cultural institutions and fashion brands.
Photo by Stephanie Teng