Iriomote Island Kuuru Koubou Symphony :
A Leading Case for Coexisting with Nature and the Resurgence of Culture, Chapter 1
By Akiko Ishigaki and Mahito Yamamoto
Translated by Tetsu Ito

Excerpt form the document

Okinawa is a prefecture known for its magnificent dyeing and weaving styles. Kuuru Koubou, located in Iriomote Island, is in itself unique for producing fabrics based on profound knowledge of threads and dyes from natural materials.

Akiko moved from Taketomi Island, where the tradition of dyeing and weaving has been handed down for a long time, to Iriomote Island, where the tradition completely disappeared, and took on the challenge of recreating the environment for dyeing and weaving from scratch. Akiko acquired excellent skills as a weaver of traditional Yaeyama-jofu on Taketomi Island. But on Iriomote Island, traditional weaving had long since disappeared so it had to be recreated from the ground up. Akiko fundamentally reconsidered the relationships among nature, dyeing and weaving, and island life, as well as the relationship between handicrafts and modern life, in the process of recreating her work environment.

… the key feature of Kuuru Koubou is that it creates an environment where all the basic items such as main dyes and threads, except for cotton, can be made instead of outsourced. Akiko realized that the process of creating such an environment not only requires traditional techniques, but also greatly stimulates the inquisitive mind in trying out various new possibilities.

For Akiko, her primary concern was to pursue sericulture to produce raw silk well-suited to ito-basho so that she could weave gumbou with ito-basho and silk. For this purpose, she planted a variety of mulberries, including a hybrid of shima-guwa (island mulberry) and tropical mulberry, and examined their growth.