Marrakesh Express
Women Weavers OnLine
Ben Smim
This is Aicha Baadou, who made the rug below. You can tell something about these women from the photo: we were joking with her and she couldn't stop laughing. This is much closer to their usual character than the dour and constrained women that many westerners expect to find in the Muslim world. She has two children, ages 3 and 12. The eldest is a girl who is in the sixth grade. Aicha's husband is a taxi driver, and she uses her earnings from weaving to help buy food for the family.
Piece 2.12335 is a flatweave with an interesting range of colors. The peachy pink and pumpkin orange remind me of the colors of the local rock, used in the doorway above. There is also a slightly grayed green, a soft red, and black, with design stripes and lots of sequins. You can see the colors and design stripes better on this close-up. This piece measures 5'2" x 10'1" and costs $365.
This is Zuhor Ganoun and she made the pieces below. She's standing on a landing in her home, and like many women, she likes house plants. She has four children, including a daughter of 20 who is married. Her other daughter and two sons are in school, and she plans to use her earnings to buy tennis shoes for one of the boys. Her husband is young but in poor health - he has asthma so does not work.
Pieces 2.12285 and 2.12286 are a set, the first item a small coverlet or hanging and the second two matching pillows. You can buy all three, or each individually. They are made of off-white wool with thin stripes of white cotton and white acrylic tufts, decorated with sequins. On the close-up you can see the back of the pillows on the right (it shows in the larger photo too), with alternating stripes in wool and nubbly cotton. The coverlet measures 2'8" x 4'1" and costs $75. The pillows are about 15" square, although one is a bit smaller on one side (13.5"), and each costs $39.
