Yes, it’s October, and the new Bishopston swatches have just arrived!
The most exciting thing about this is that they’ve just introduced a new fabric weight – a Fair Trade cotton lawn! They’re the swatches on the left – the colours mostly match the regular cottons, but the fabric is a much lighter weight.
The new cotton lawns can’t be formally certified as organic – the farmers’ plots are so small that they are prone to contamination by chemicals blown across from neighbouring farms. Apparently it takes one weaver a whole working day to weave just 3 metres of cloth by hand! The finished pieces are 19-20 metres long, so that’s a whole week’s work.
I’ve just sent an email to find out whether the lawn comes in black and unbleached, like the regular cottons. Once I know, I can start to work out what my next order’s going to be!