in which we visit a carpet farm

Today we went to visit a carpet farm – strange name for a carpet factory but that is how they are known. We met up with Engin, who was to be our guide for the day and off we set, admiring the view of the Green Valley en route.

He drove us to his village, Etrim,

where we stopped for a coffee in a traditional coffee house normally only frequented by the men of the village, who spend hours playing a game called 101 or OK. It is played with tiles but is in fact a variation of the card game called Rummy.

After coffee Engin took us to see the oldest buildings in the village which belong to his grandparents. One of them was used for the animals – note the roof has been covered over with turf for insulation. The other was a one roomed house in which up to 10 people would have slept at night.

P was keen to be photographed astride an old butter churn and then lent a hand collecting eggs.

Across the courtyard was another, more modern two-room house where his grandparents live. It is customary to remove your shoes before entering the house as people eat and sleep on the floor and it helps to keep the house clean. First he showed us the room where his grandmother weaves carpets. His grandfather is 84 and his grandmother, aged 74, is still weaving carpets by hand although she only works 4 or 5 hours a day now.

Local sheep provide the wool which is spun to make both the warp and the weft of the carpets. Only the weft, which is the thread which is woven horizontally and which is also knotted, is coloured and is traditionally dyed using vegetable dyes. Etrim used to produce first quality tobacco which produces both brown and yellow dyes. Various roots produce red coloured dyes and onion skins produce orange shades. Colour variations result from the fact that sometimes a weaver will run out of particular coloured wool and it is impossible to reproduce exactly the same shade using vegetable dyes. Engin’s grandmother makes knots every two warp threads with the weft thread which makes the carpet much stronger and which gives the carpets the name “double knotted”. After each row of knots she passes the thread through twice to reinforce the knots. Every couple of rows she cuts off the excess wool using a pair of scissors as ancient as the hills.

She carries the patterns in her head although she had a sample carpet near the loom just to remind her. The patterns are all traditional and the carpets carry the name of the village in which they are produced. Girls coming from villages further away will bring different patterns with them and these are passed from mother to daughter. A typical carpet from Etrim will contain the traditional patterns of the image of an aubergine, a tobacco plant and a river, which symbolises life. A small carpet – about 1m50 by 1m will take about one month to make. Larger ones obviously take much longer and this is what dictates the price. There are three types of carpet – the ones which are knotted and the ones which are flat-woven (these are the kilims). On both of these the pattern is the same on the reverse side as is it is on the top side. The third type of carpet is embroidered and this is immediately obvious when you look at the back, which is full of knots and loose threads. On the walls of this room hung a number of carpets which had been Engin’s grandmother’s dowry.

In the second room, which was used as a bedroom, was a large fridge, which they had inherited from their children when they bought a newer model, a TV and a cupboard containing all the bedding which is spread on the floor each night. Cooking is done in the fireplace. The red carpet on the floor was woven in 1946 but the colours are as vivid today as they were when it was first made. You can see in this photo the colour variations resulting from different dye batches being used.

We were struck by the simplicity of their life in comparison to ours. Before leaving we purchased a bar of olive oil soap and a bottle of olive oil, which the family produce during the winter months.

From there we went to Engin’s family’s house where all the carpets are collected. They operate as a cooperative which means that carpets come from outlying villages to be sold from a central outlet. There must have been a couple of hundred of carpets there although at any one time there are about three thousand carpets available for sale within the village.

Engin’s mother had prepared a delicious lunch consisting of local bread, a salad of tomato, lettuce and dill, dried beans with a tomato sauce, yoghurt, fried potatoes and a sort of meat patty. DH and I sampled the local red wine. As it was cold they lit a fire for us and sat on the floor to eat our lunch.

Afterwards Engin drove us back and we stopped, en route, to buy some prawns from a local fishmonger which we ate for dinner that night.