Twenty five folk artisans from different areas of Moldova are attending a workshop of dying wool with natural colorants under the slogan “Restoring a century-forgotten art”. The workshop takes place on August 21-22 in the Rustic Art Center in Clisova Noua village, Orhei district, with the participation of the Ministry of Culture, the National Museum of Ethnography and Natural History and local authorities.

Ecaterina Popescu, head of the craftsmanship center Rustic Art, told IPN that such measures are meant to make the old-style weaving of carpets an economic basis for many villages. The workshop gathered weavers, researchers, museographers and officials from the field of culture. “The Bessarabian carpet is renowned throughout the world and connoisseurs are looking for it on the market, but seldom find it”, said Popescu.

In order to offer qualified answers to the artisans' questions about this craft, all the traditional works and techniques to weave carpets and dye wool with plants will be demonstrated during the workshop, the first of its kind. It will be followed by others in various carpeting centers in order to boost this craft and adjust it to social demand.

Specialists say that dying wool with plants is an ancient art and hard to master, but it remains attractive to craftsmen and artists. It has a palette of 30 colors, without synthetic colorants, and in time, the wool becomes pastel-colored and remains always beautiful.