Hannahs' Room - by Ian

On Tuesday (17th February) we had an informative and fun talk from Rox of Hannah’s Room. A well attended meeting where members and guests braved the traffic congestion and cold weather.

Rox started off by explaining where the name ‘Hannah’s Room’ came from. A story many of us are familiar with. Hannah and Rox are sisters and Hannah was the first to leave the family home. Always a wrench when the first chick leaves the nest but every cloud has a silver lining. Hannahs Room became mum’s sewing room and in 1999 a fabric empire was born. Hannah’s Room started by being specialists in the Indonesian Batik Fabric.

Rox explain the technical aspects of the Batik process, dot and scribe. The dot being literally a dot the scribe is done by using a special tool to draw/write, with melted wax on the fabric. The wax acts as a resist to the dye, melted and washed off the colour of the original fabric is revealed. Rox showed slides of each stage in the process.

Batick was mainly produced in Java and in 2009 UNESCO declared Batik as a protected craft. Dutch merchants introduced Batik to Europe and invented a process to speed up production and tried to sell Batik back to Indonesia. The Indonesians rejected the poor quality fabrics but realised they needed to work at producing their own tools to compete. Rox showed us a ‘chop’ (not unlike an Indian printers block but in metal) this allowed them to quickly produce repeat patterns.

Modern Batik is still handmade, using natural dies, bees wax and air drying the fabrics. Today other things are considered. Not only the quality, thread count and colour fastness but Hannah's Room also looks at the environmental credentials, ethical principles, salary and protection of local culture of its suppliers.



Rox showed us examples of quilts made with batik fabrics, cushion kits, journal quilts and postcard quilts. Rox talked about her journey into hand sewing and pattern writing. Things that were started through necessity but turned into passions. Rox ended with a fun Q&A session. Then we were let loose on the beautiful Batiks and kits available … Reader I don’t know how it happened but my wallet found its way into my pocket and I found myself ordering 1m of fabric that caught my eye. Well it did have sea horses on it ! Not something you see every day …