Carla Fernandez Gap Denim Skirt

This is the one garment in the selection whose record tells you where it was made, and the answer is San Juan Chamula, in the highlands of Chiapas. It is a Tsotsil town, it is one of the most fiercely self-governing communities in Mexico, and it is a place with a weaving and dyeing tradition that owes nothing to anybody’s revival of it. Carla Fernández has worked with weavers there for years; when she showed at SITE Santa Fe in 2016, San Juan Chamula was among the communities named in the work.

The skirt is denim and it is naturally dyed, which is a different proposition from denim that has been through an indigo vat at scale. Natural dyeing gives an uneven, living color that moves across the cloth rather than sitting flat on it, and it goes on moving: it will lighten where it is worn and it will not lighten uniformly. This one has landed at gray. The construction detail worth knowing is at the back, where the slit is adjustable and fastens with buttons, so the skirt’s walking room is something you set rather than something the pattern cutter decided for you. Cotton throughout.

Why we selected it

A denim skirt is the most ordinary garment we could have taken from this house, and that is exactly why we took it. It is the piece that carries hand dyeing and a named place of making into a wardrobe that is otherwise entirely industrial, and it does it without asking to be treated as an object.

Carla Fernández’s work is made with artisan cooperatives across Mexico, and this is the piece in the selection whose record names the community.

Materials and construction

100% cotton. Naturally dyed denim, gray. Adjustable back slit fastening with buttons. Made in San Juan Chamula, Chiapas.

Fit notes

A denim skirt with an adjustable back slit is a skirt whose stride is variable by design, so how narrow it reads is partly a decision you make each time you put it on. Denim of any weight softens and gives across a day and comes back with washing. Natural dye will mark differently from mill dye at the points of wear, at the seat and along the hem, and that is the material behaving correctly rather than failing.

Styling

With the Top Teco or the Camisa Xochitlan tucked. Under the Capa Charra Gris Calado Negro, where gray against gray with black leather is the most considered version of this whole selection. With a flat shoe, since the slit is doing the work on the leg.

Care

Naturally dyed cloth gives up color, and it gives up most of it early, so wash this alone the first several times and in cold water, and do not leave it damp against anything pale. Wash it inside out and as rarely as the garment will let you; denim is improved by being worn and diminished by being laundered. Air dry rather than tumbling, which is what sets a permanent crease into an indigo or natural ground. Our care guidance covers the rest.

Related pieces

The Falda Meztli is a skirt named for the moon in Nahuatl, and the Pantalón Concreto is a trouser named for concrete. Everything we carry from Carla Fernández is listed together.