Lidia Lopez is a Mayan woman from San Antionio Aguas Calientes, Guatemala. She has been weaving all her life and now teaches children in Guatemala the art of weaving on a backstrap loom. She also teaches at universities around the world.
Guatemalan women use raw cotton for weaving textiles. They prepare the cotton before spinning and dying it with natural dyes.
Feria Panajachel takes over the town every October to celebrat Saint Francis of Assisi.
Lidia Lopez showing a ceremonial huipil and a huipil from Tactic and telling the meanings of the patterns on them.
Huipils and textiles made by Mayan women in Guatemala are handmade. The thread is made by cleaning and spinning cotton.
Women in Guatemala begin weaving by creating a ‘warp’ out of yarn. They wind the yarn around pegs on a warping board, crossing the strings in the middle to create a striped pattern. The warp is then attached to the bars of the loom and they are ready to begin the weaving process.
The Guatemalan women in this photo are wearing folded up ‘tzutes’ on their heads to shade their faces.