Page 33 - ผ้าไหมล้ำเลอค่า

Mudmee silk with Soi Dok Mak pattern is an ancient pattern of Isan local fabric. It is regarded
as a traditional pattern inherited from ancestors. Originally, the villagers in Maha Sarakham province
weaved this ancient pattern following the ancestors. Various patterns were weaved, but later this
ancient pattern began to disappear from the weaving lives of the villagers due to the difficulty in
weaving this pattern. Soi Dok Mak pattern is an ancient pattern that has almost disappeared from the
local area. With the fabric pattern of very high resolution, weavers needed to have expertise about the
pattern and the skills in both tying and weaving. Without expertise, dyeing may be uneven and it may
distort the fabric pattern. In addition, it took quite a long time to weave this pattern. As a consequence,
the villagers did not seem to want to weave the Soi Dok Mak pattern. Until 1997, Maha Sarakham
province organized a provincial silk pattern contest. It turned out that the kind of silk that won the first
prize was the Soi Dok Mak pattern because of its beauty and fine details. Therefore, the silk with Soi
Dok Mak pattern has been selected as the provincial pattern. This encouraged the villagers to weave
more of this pattern, leading to organizing silk weaving groups. The districts of Maha Sarakham province
have turned to produce more silk with the pattern of Soi Dok Mak.
“Soi Dok Mak pattern” is the name of the pattern based on how the ancients called it. Nowadays,
the villagers in each area may call it differently. The fish scale pattern or Khom-Kao pattern,
for example, is made by tying the Khom-Ha pattern overlapped with the Kao-Khom pattern. They are
then wrapped around to make the pattern tighter and detailed. It results in a distinctive feature as
this small pattern with fine details distributes neatly throughout the fabric. When adding color during
the tying and dying steps each time, the pattern looks beautiful, glittering, eye-catching, and more
valuable.

Maha Sarakham Precious Silk 31