Barefoot

Barefoot takes its name from what is natural and in touch with the earth, and describes itself as a story of simplicity built on the craft of weaving and the art of design. In the early 1960s the artist Barbara Sansoni was invited to design for women learning to weave in a convent workshop just north of Colombo. The company she founded now keeps a band of designers. They provide training and designs to its weavers, along with raw materials. There are no factories and no production lines, and each worker is responsible for the quality of the finished piece. The cloth is mainly cotton, with a small collection in silk and cotton. It becomes furnishings and household linens as well as fine cloth for clothes. Needlewomen then turn the hand-woven fabric into bags and clothes and into soft furniture and soft toys. Work is taken to where people live rather than asking people to travel to work. The company runs its own dye plant with a certified water treatment plant. Its dyes carry Blue Sign and Oeko-Tex certification. Sansoni's brilliant colour and simple geometry give the cloth a character recognised abroad, where it is exported under her name. In Colombo the shop at 704 Galle Road joins an art gallery and a bookshop, with a courtyard cafe. A second shop stands inside the Galle Fort, in the town of Galle itself.