MONDAY, NOvEMBER 7, 2016

l if e st yleF E A T U R E S

These jeans are beyond

vintage: ‘1800s Levi’s up

for auction

There are vintage jeans. And then there are jeans from theAmerican Wild West that are up for auction. A Maine auc-tion house is putting up for bid a bona fide pair of Levi’s

blue jeans bought in 1893. Daniel Buck Auctions & Appraisalssays the jeans were ordered for Solomon Warner, who partici-pated in the creation of the Arizona Territory. Warner worethem only a few times. The jeans ended up in a trunk.

The 123-year-old pants go up for auction Saturday inLisbon Falls, Maine, and are expected to bring in tens of thou-sands of dollars due to their pristine condition. Warner was abig fella. The cotton jeans with button fly feature a size 44 waistand 36-inch inseam. — AP

This undated photo provided by Daniel Buck Auctions &Appraisals shows the right front pocket on a pair of 1893Levi-Strauss denim blue jeans in pristine condition thatwill go up for auction. — AP photos The front of a pair of 1893 Levi-Strauss denim blue jeans. The leather label on a pair of 1893 Levi-Strauss denim

blue jeans.

With the deftness of decades of experience, AbuMohammad wove thick green thread with a woodenloom in northwest Syria, creating a vibrant geomet-

ric pattern renowned among Arabic textiles. It was the lastday before the weaver in his 50s would be forced to close theworkshop, leaving the last five remaining looms in his home-town of Ariha in Idlib province to gather dust. “This trade isdead now... Today is our last day of work on the loom, as wedon’t have any more thread,” the balding man told AFP.

Weaving has been devastated by Syria’s five-year civil war,with thread becoming too difficult to procure from Aleppo-once the country’s artisanal hub but now ravaged by fightingand bombardment. The battered city, 70 kilometers (45 miles)northeast of Ariha, was the main provider of the rough threadneeded to weave Arabic textiles, versatile fabrics turned intorugs, furniture covers, and other household items. But nowAleppo’s rebel-held eastern districts are besieged by govern-ment forces, making it impossible to obtain thread from there,and materials from the regime-controlled west are too expen-sive, Abu Mohammad said. On his last day, he worked asenthusiastically as he had since his teenage years, pullingdown wooden levers to lay down colorful acrylic fibre across awhite base. The sound of the panels smacking against eachother was interrupted only by Abu Mohammad’s nasalsinging, or a brief tea break with fellow weavers reclining on ashabby couch.

‘All we have left’ “Ariha, in Idlib province, is the most well-known in making

this product,” said Abu Mohammad, gesturing to the green-and-red blankets and pillow cases hanging on the wall behindhim. “We make all household items, from rugs for bedrooms tocovers for the Quran. We would furnish entire houses.” “Beforethe war, there were more than 100 looms in Ariha, but theonly ones left are the ones in this shop,” he said. As the siegeon Aleppo’s east tightened and access to thread became moredifficult, only three looms in the Ariha workshop remainedactive. “Before the war, our trade was booming. We could buythread for pennies from Aleppo,” Abu Mohammad said.

He pulled out a small box containing dozens of spools ofcolorful thread: “This is all we have left.” Today, a kilogram(around two pounds) of the blend of cotton and polyesterused for the textiles costs 3,500 Syrian pounds ($7), up from175 pounds before the war. Abu Mohammad points to a rughanging on the wall: “Before, I could make this whole rugwith just 200 Syrian pounds.” Another lifelong weaver, 40-year-old Abu Mostafa, said he began working a loom whenhe was about 12.

He tried to find stable work in a different field but neverfelt comfortable doing anything except weaving, he said, ashe pumped the wooden panels below his loom. “I went toLebanon and worked in construction and then to Turkey for afew months, but I couldn’t hold any job that kept me awayfrom a loom for too long.”

‘It’s a shame’ Abu Mostafa beamed with pride as he reminisced about

the robes and pillow covers he would produce. “No one elsecould make the pieces we made. They looked as if they wereprinted,” he said. “I challenge any computer to make some-thing like this!” The products from rebel-held Ariha wereonce sold across Syria. Even as the war raged on, they wereexported to areas controlled by regime forces like Damascusand Hama, as well as regional markets like Lebanon andSaudi Arabia.

But today transporting the woven goods-whether in oroutside Syria-takes between two and three months and isexorbitantly expensive. “We used to send our products toDamascus at 10:00 am and they would get there by 2:00 pm,”Abu Mohammad said. Despite the pressures, Arabic textileproduction will resume eventually, the veteran weaver insist-ed. If there was enough thread, “we could work 100 looms atonce. The looms are all ready, we just need the thread.” “It’s ashame it’s going to end like this.” — AFP

Syrian weaver Abu Mohammad displays an unfinished carpet at a workshop in the villageof Ariha. — AFP photos

Syrian weaver Abu Mohammad (left) works on a loom at aworkshop in the village of Ariha.

Abu Ahmed works on a weaving loom at a workshop in the village of Ariha.

Syria’s last weavers abandon looms without thread‘Ariha is the most well-known in making this product’

‘I challenge any computer

to make something like this!’

Syrian weavers work on looms at a workshop.

Syrian weavers work on looms at a workshop.

A Syrian weaverworks on a loom at

a workshop.

A Syrian weaver spins thread at a workshop.

Syrian weavers Abu Mostafa (front) and Abu Mohammadwork on looms at a workshop.

Abu Mohammed (second left) sits with his colleagues AbuMostafa (second right) and Abu Ahmed during a break ata weaving workshop.

A general view shows a weaving loom at a workshop inthe village of Ariha.

A general view shows threads at a weaving workshop inthe village of Ariha.