Origin of Design of Tsugaru KOGIN Embroidery

— From the Perspective of Textile Science, History and Climate —

Abstract

  Cotton was not cultivated and farmers wore ramie kimonos in Tsugaru during the Edo period. Tsugaru KOGIN embroidery using cotton threads was developed to improve warmth and durability of ramie cloth. Various experiments have shown that KOGIN embroidery improves the cloth's thickness, weight, softness, warmth and abrasion resistance, while reducing its breathability. Most old KOGIN designs are vertically elongated diamond-shapes with an average width/length ratio of 0.78. The backstory to the birth of the KOGIN designs was examined from the perspective of textile, climate, history and the living conditions of the people in Tsugaru. KOGIN embroidery is compared with Nanbu HISHIZASHI embroidery. People wove textiles with a weft density lower than their warp density for various reasons, including the stiffness of ramie threads, the force required for hand looms, shortages of ramie thread, and the abundance of other works. The use of these textiles resulted in a vertically elongated, diamond-shaped KOGIN design.