On the 14^th October, SILKNOW had its final review meeting. All work packages were presented, after a discussion, the work done so far in SILKNOW was approved according to the EU standards. It has been more than three years of weaving our past into the future. We have woven a network with different users, from museums to young designers, from technology to traditional industries. All to protect, conserve and disseminate the important heritage of silk.  Here is a summary of what we have been weaving these years and why.

Silk has surrounded us for centuries, from royal beds to traditional costumes, from liturgical vestments to ceremonial flag. It has been everywhere, within the Silk Road,  but also beyond it. Silk weaving has shaped manufacturing cities and trade routes, engaging visual artists, engineers and multitudes of workers.

Community, identity, history…Tangible and intangible experiences, technology, knowledge, arts and crafts inherited generation after generation. It is a link from the past to the future.  This heritage is still alive, but it may die soon. The artisans who used to weave using traditional techniques and looms are disappearing. Valuable historical fabrics are endangered by their sheer fragility. But technology continues to be very close to silk heritage, even today.

“The Analytical Engine weaves algebraic patterns, just as the Jacquard loom weaves flowers and leaves.”

We have taken Ada Lovelace’s words as an inspiration to merge humanities and technology, in a team coming from six European countries. We have been working during three years to protect and disseminate silk heritage, weaving a net among academia, computing, arts and crafts, design, and creative industries.

Conferences, exhibitions, fashion catwalks, training and capacity building programs, publications, all around silk heritage, have contributed to illuminate its important past, and its promising future.

In addition to that, we have created some digital tools

We have worked to create a unique resource, a thesaurus about silk in four languages, including one thousand words. It is based on many sources from across Europe,so that experts, museums, and just about anyone can delve deep into this knowledge.

Looking carefully at historical techniques, we have produced a digital memory tool, the Virtual Loom, that is able to weave on screen like a Jacquard loom does, giving the creative industries a chance for experimentation and business.

We have integrated the information from many museums bringing together data about thousands of objects around the globe locating them in time and space, giving everyone access to this hidden but precious heritage.

In short, we continue to weave the past into our future. Do you want to join us?

Related news:

• Our tools
  • Thesaurus
  • Virtual Loom
  • ADASilk
  • STMaps
  • Educational Materials
• Our publications
• Our conferences
• Our net actions
• Our deliverables

On the  5th and  6h of May, the SILKNOW team held an online meeting to discuss the project’s advancements. This meeting was originally going to take place in Nice, France at EURECOM Headquarters but, due to COVID-19, we had to hold it online.  Confined but active, we used these two days to explain each Work Package advancements and the interdisciplinary work they require.

The connections between the Virtual Loom and the modelling of textual annotations were discussed, we also began to coordinate the integration of new classes and properties with the expertise of our colleagues from CNRS-Université Lumière-Lyon 2.  This led to a discussion on the coverage of our Knowledge Graph as we want to consider also these objects that explain how silk heritage has evolved over time.  Next, our Italian colleagues from UNIPA explained to us how they are going to evaluate all the SILKNOW tools.  Finally, we saw for the first time how the Search Engine will be… but we do not want to let the cat out of the box!

These were two fruitful days, we showed that even in quarantine our team remains strong and still from our homes, we keep weaving our past into the future.

On the 11^th and 12^th of December, the SILKNOW team gathered at the LUH HQ in Hannover, Germany.  The session was opened with a short meeting with the SILKNOW EEAB, where the project advancements where showed.

Next, each Work Package leader explained the progress report and cross-work packages discussions were held, especially regarding the impact of the extension of the ontology. It was the time to talk about how to connect the Thesaurus with the Virtual Loom, CIDOC-CRM and the Ontology.  Many philosophical and technical discussions were conducted, the interdisciplinarity of the team was key to address the problems we found on our way. Textiles in general, and silk in particular, have an extra difficulty to understand their materiality, their construction and their evolution in time, that is why, SILKNOW has art historians, artisans, textile engineers, ICT engineers and digital savvy’s in their team.

Finally, the next face-to-face meeting was scheduled, it will take place in May in Nice.

After one year working to preserve silk heritage, we can just say…wow! We haven’t just worked hard to protect silk; we have been breathing and living it: we became youtubers, we have defended social equality and we have met people as crazy for silk as we are.

The SILKNOW team has met in 4 different locations: Valencia, Lyon, Bled and Madrid. During these meetings we have shared and accomplished our tasks in order to prepare the SILKNOW tools and we have discussed the project´s future steps.

Especially, we wove our friendship. Hopefully, you will weave with us our past into the future!

The meeting was attended by leading institutions of the Lyon textile world, such as the Musée d’Art et d’Industrie Saint-Etienne, the Musée des Tissus de Lyon, the Musée de Bourgoin Jailleu and the Denis & fils SAS or the the Tissages Perrin . The Service Patrimoines et Inventaire général- Direction de la culture et du patrimoine- Région ARA, the President of the Commission Qualité et Technique d’Intersoie France and the Director of the Instituto Cervantes center in Lyon were also present at the meeting.

During the meeting, both museums and creative industries highlighted the impact that SILKNOW will have in their institutions. For SMEs, it will provide new ways of access to historical pieces that can provide inspiration for contemporary creativity, as well as the preservation of traditional weaving techniques and the know-how associated to them. For museums, on the other hand, the project will improve access and preservation of silk heritage through the standardization of terms thanks to a multilingual thesaurus. In short, SILKNOW will preserve and disseminate silk heritage by weaving the past into the future.

Finally, during the internal sessions, all partners reported on progress of the entire project and each work package. The main tasks during the upcoming months are automated image analysis and the multilingual thesaurus, two of the key milestones in the project.