123 Tamba fu (Tamba cloth)

Usually known as ‘Tamba momen’ (Tamba cotton), such cloth was woven mainly in Saji town (of Tamba area in present day Hyogo prefecture) and sold in Kyoto and Osaka, usually for bedclothes or tanzen (large padded kimono). Spun and woven by hand, and dyed mostly with indigo blue and alder tree brown, it is a warm cotton of soft texture and deep aesthetic quality. It is distinctive in using an undyed, untwisted weft at regular intervals and forming stripes. Tamba cloth thrived in the late Edo period (mid C19th) and declined in the mid Meiji (late C19th). Due to its rough texture, this cloth does not wear well but is all the more warm and aesthetically pleasing for it.
(“The Complete Works of Soetsu Yanagi — Pictorial records — Soetsu Yanagi’s collection — Encyclopedia of Mingei vol. 3”, The Japan Folk Crafts Museum (ed.), published 30th November 1981.)