Hello all,

I ended up here chasing down some topics related to the uses of Andean braids and the similar Japanese braiding techniques called "kumihimo". 

I do a lot of Japanese braiding, mostly on a Japanese style marudai (Japanese for "round stand"). I use all kinds of fibers from hemp, linen, cotton, rayon, silk, wool, and synthetic polys.

I have tried many of the patterns from Rodrick Owen books referred to as Peruvian or Andean (in particular, his 250 Braids book and his co-authored Sling Braiding book).  I also have a pretty substantial library of kumihimo and braiding books in English, Japanese, and German.

I am enjoying perusing the topics here and seeing how I may be able to work some of my skill set into braided slings.

Very nice to be here, and happy to answer any questions anyone may have related to Japanese braiding methods.  Thanks for accepting me into this forum.

Cheers,
BRG

Rat Man wrote on Jun 20^th, 2025 at 7:43am:


Just as a little teaser here is a picture of a 9 element Japanese braid called “shige-uchi”.  It is a very strong flat braid used historically as an attachment binding (sageo) for securing the scabbard (saya) of a katana sword to the belt (obi) of samurai.