Vintage Miao Hmong Hill Tribe Northern Thailand Textile Fabric 苗族

Over the last week I have been clearing out my closets and going through various boxes of stuff to list items on eBay so I can get rid of the things I no longer have interest in, need, have a use for or just don't want, and then I can use the extra cash to buy something I do want,  such as more Asian art or antiques, etc.

  So, here I was yesterday afternoon going through an old box of stuff when I pulled out this old textile fabric that I have had for the last 16 months, yet I had no clue whatsoever what it was until yesterday.  It used to belong to my next door neighbor who left it outside with a box of other stuff after she finished having a yard sale, and since she was giving it away for free, I decided to take it home since I had an interest in making things with my sewing machine.  

I was contemplating on whether or not it was an item that would be of interest to anyone on eBay, so I began using Google to research and try to identify it, and well, it's just my stroke of luck that it happens to be a textiles fabric hand made by the Hmong people, an Asian ethnic group from the mountainous regions of China, Vietnam, Laos, and Thailand.  Hmong are a subgroup of Miao 苗族..   Maybe it was my intuition, but I'm happy I decided to take it home even though at the time I had no idea that it was Asian

While I can't accurately ascertain which country this fabric originated, nor can I even date it, looking around and reading about Hmong textiles, it appears likely that it's from the Northern Thailand Hmong, which are often referred to as the Hill Tribe. So, since I identified it as Asian in origin and having read quite a bit online about Hmong people, I have decided that I should keep it as part of my collection of Asian art, and now instead of keeping it in a box, it is proudly displayed as a wall hanging. :)

You can read about the Hmong people on Wikipedia.  I find this very interesting and fascinating.  It's always a great learning experience to discover and learn about different cultures and people.