About Wraps and Little Wraps—or About Making Wishes Come True?

About Wraps and Little Wraps—or About Making Wishes Come True?

About ten years ago, I tried carrying a baby in a woven wrap for the first time. I tied the wrap—and that was it: I fell in love with the feeling that the fabric was just right—its softness, suppleness and perfect functionality for my purpose. That was when I first had the idea of weaving my own wraps, my own fabrics that I would enjoy working with.

And because “made in Israel” and the “blue-and-white label” mean much more to me than just words, I started looking for a way to weave wraps in Israel. I dug through a mountain of information about our country’s weaving businesses, asked questions, checked and double-checked. I was offered countless opportunities to weave everything I needed in China, in the territories and in India, but I refused to believe it could not be done in Israel…

Eventually, I obtained the phone numbers of all the weaving mills still operating in the country—all three of them! I started meeting their owners and learned the sad story of the decline of Israel’s weaving industry. It turned out that just fifteen years earlier, Israel had more than thirty mills producing high-quality goods, most of them internationally renowned and operating on a large scale.

Sadly, almost all production had been moved to China, Turkey and India because of cheaper labor and lower taxes. Four factories remained in Israel, able to compete only through sophisticated, high-tech materials and continual advances in chemistry and technology.

In short, these people work miracles. They create antibacterial and fire-resistant fabrics, fabrics that let air through but keep water out, and “breathable” foam. The foam is currently being tested and may be used as cushioning in our buckle carriers, making them lighter and more breathable (pictured on the left and right).

But let’s return to our story.

Eight years ago, the owner of one of these factories, undeterred by the lack of suitable raw materials and colored yarns or by my requirement for environmentally friendly production, agreed to create a fabric sample for me. He warned me, however, that he probably would not achieve the quality I wanted. The woven samples were lovely, but to my perfectionist eye, a little too coarse.

It was only a couple of years later that woven wraps comparable to sandpaper in thickness and roughness appeared on the market. At the time, my benchmarks were Girasol and Didymos wraps, and the samples fell a little short of their quality. We had a wonderful time trying out the samples at a babywearing meetup in Nahariya on July 28, 2010, and they soon became wonderful mei tais.

Many people are familiar with those samples—they can be found in mei tai carriers, such as the gray-and-natural butterfly fabric. No fewer than seven years have passed since then, and throughout that time, it bothered me that the fabrics I used in production were… the best I could find, but mostly Italian, Turkish, German or from just about anywhere except Israel.

A couple of months ago, the owner of one of the factories and I began experimenting to achieve the best possible result within our existing constraints: no raw materials, yarns or colored yarns, and only a white warp and standard, previously developed patterns available.

We calculated, tested and measured again and again, and… the result exceeded my wildest expectations!

They turned out wonderfully in terms of quality, support, wrapping properties, density… everything, really. The natural-colored wraps are also completely ecological, made exclusively from pure, unbleached cotton. The colored yarn in the two-color wraps is dyed under pressure using a special process that makes it resistant to chlorine. In other words, the wrap can be washed with chlorine bleach: the white warp will whiten, while the colored yarn will remain unaffected. So this is a wrap for special occasions, everyday life—and even cleaning.

This Monday, work began on the first pilot run of wraps in five colorways and eight different prints. Wish us luck and send us some encouragement; in return, I promise to treat you to occasional sneak peeks from the scene. For now, here is the very beginning: gray cross-twill weaving and monochrome butterflies.

Caution! A mesmerizing sight!