Browsing by Subject "pula-aika"

Thesis narrates a dressmaker's life in a small village called Itäkylä, located in Lappajärvi municipality in the late 1940s and in the early 1950s. This study is placed in the history of craft and craft culture. It is a narrative study; the literature and empiric data discusses with each other through the entire study. The aim was to understand the studied phenomenon, in this case the dressmaker's work and to describe and interpret it in the light of her time. How much the environment in which she grew up affected the dressmaker's career choice? What was Itäkylä's craft culture like during the Second World War and after it? What kind of craft traditions the dressmaker's childhood home offered and above all, what it was like to be a dressmaker in the 1940s and 1950s in a small rural village community? The perspective of this study is in micro-history and craft culture that surrounded the dressmaker. The study is a narrative and the empiric data consists of interviews with 83 years old informant. The aim was to collect her stories, and the transcribed data consists of sixty pages. The interview data was processed in a narrative way; a new story, the dressmaker's biography was created on the basis of it. The analysis is a data-oriented narrative content analysis. The data were divided in eight different themes, which reflected the study's chronology. During the dressmaker's childhood and youth, crafts were present in everyday life and they were associated with positive memories and encouragement. In the stories she told, the post-war countryside is coloured as a world that was dominated by women. Itäkylä was known for its linen fields. Crafts were villagers' daily life and an important economic activity. The dressmaker's work in the late 40s and early 50s seems to have been a busy but rewarding occupation, where the most stress was caused by the shortage of fabrics and materials. Due to the period of shortage, the dressmaker's ingenuity was under severe strain. She has, however, experienced herself as a self-confident seamstress. Patterns were not used in making clothes, which was typical in rural areas. The informant's home environment and surrounding craft culture seem to have been a good seedbed on her way to become a dressmaker.

My research is object study on textiles and footwear during times of 1940s depression. The aim of the study was to find out what materials the objects in the collection were made of, what working methods had been used in their manufacture, and what kind of features and solutions were found in the objects typical of the depression time. Finland experienced a depression as a result of the Second World War from 1939 onwards. Foreign trade relations were severed and grain harvests in their own country suffered from drought, so the sale of food and goods began to be rationed. Rationing lasted until 1954, when the last foods were released from rationing. During the depression, clothes were made from all possible materials that could be found in attics and fences. Fabrics that were not usually used to make clothes were now pre-cisely utilized. Substitute materials were also developed to replace fabrics, the most common of which was paper. Among other things, shoe covers, curtains and sheets were made from it. Self-sufficiency increased during depression and rationing, and the cultivation of flax, for exam-ple, became more common. Linen was a common material for textiles during times of shortage. Footwear was made of wood, thick fabrics and reeds. Textiles from depression time have been studied before. Most of the research has been based on interviews or written sources. Anna Vesamäki has done object study on textiles during depression in the elevator market field, and my own research is very similar to Vesamäki's research. Vesamäki studied the clothes handed over to the University Museum by the Kotitalouskeskus. She chose clothes made of adult woven fabric for her material. I used the same collection of as yet unexplored textiles and footwear in my research. In my material there are three breeches and a suit made of woven fabric (includes a jacket and breeches), baby knitted pants, a hand towel, a washing mitt, eight socks made of different materials, two mit-tens, two pairs of stables, three reed shoes and a pan cap. I study objects by applying the model that Vesamäki has used in his own research, following the model developed by Jules Prown (1982). Research is basic research. I will first describe the objects and introduce their materials and methods of manufacture. After that, I examine whether the pre-inducing materi-als, manufacturing methods or other features of the objects are typical of the depression time. The textiles and footwear were made from materials typical of the depression and with typical manufacturing methods. All clothing made of woven fabric contained linen. Several ex-tension pieces were found on the clothes, which indicates that the fabrics have been used very precisely. The socks used a lot of wool and linen, as well as human hair and animal hair. Both clothes and socks are rough, and the fabrics are partially of poor quality and have flaws. Socks and mittens seem high-quality, despite the roughness. The footwear contained materials very typical for the depression. Both stables were made of woolen fabric and the other shoes were made of braided reeds. The pan cap was also made from reeds. However, all the items in my material are neat and carefully prepared.