Mena Small Silk Shawl
$70.00 — Sold Out
Our 'Mena' Small Shawl is a timeless beauty with a powerful history. It's the perfect size to wear as a wrap, or as a large bunchy scarf.
Women in the central highlands of Madagascar are famous for crafting wild silk cloth called Lamba Mena. Lamba Mena is traditional silk cloth that is believed to hold sacred ancestral power. Although 'lamba mena' literally translates as 'red cloth', the ceremonial cloth can also be woven with bold striping patterns including gold, green, black, and white.
This shawl is completely handmade - hand spun yarn, naturally dyed with nato bark, and hand woven on a floor loom. The women of the Solidarity Cooperative craft each piece in their small village in the central highlands of Madagascar.
This shawl contains 100% wild Borocera silk, a species of silkworm only found in Madagascar. This beautiful piece will last a lifetime.
Your purchase directly helps a weaver in our cooperative support her family. It also preserves the cultural tradition of silk weaving in Madagascar.
Each piece comes with a lovely tag that tells the story of the silk and has washing instructions.
Washing instructions: Hand-wash cool with any kind of soap. Lay flat to dry. Iron while still damp to give it a lovely sheen. Separately, you can steam iron it on a low-ish setting to refresh it from time to time without washing. This also gives it a lovely sheen.
Dimensions: 17" wide x 80" long. This is what we call a "small shawl" which is slightly longer and wider than our scarves, but not as wide as our "large shawls". Both small and large shawls are about the same length though. Some people wear our small shawls as bunchy scarves, and others prefer to wear them as a shawl/wrap wrapped around the shoulders.
