Do you know “Te nu gu i”? It means “Japanese old/traditional towel” (in straight, it is just a cotton cloth). It has a long history. The theory says it has been since the Nara era (approximately 1300 years ago). The size is about 30 cm in length and 90 – 100 cm long.
How is it useful? And colors/patterns
The reason is that cotton cloth has multiple ways to be utilized. For example, sweeping sweat, wrapping any stuff to carry, covering the mouse as a mask, or wearing it on our heads as a hat. It also can be a scarf.
Even now, many Japanese use it as an eco-back.
- Variation of the cloth
Its design and patterns have been well developed In the Edo era (From 1603 AC to 1863 AC) as well as color patterns.
At the time, all Tenugui were dyed by hand with many different ingredients. The most popular one was “knotweed”.
Please see the pictures below.
As technology improved in modern times, the procedure of dyeing changed, for example, printing with machines.
So now, the Tenugui has a more colorful and unique pattern. Sometimes, famous characters are on it. For example, there are collaborations with Godzilla or Pokémon.
To close
In conclusion, it was just a cloth. However, the Japanese managed to use it to make daily work easier because any resource was small.
So, the cloth is from the cleverness.
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