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I first saw the Pomak textiles in black and white felt form in Lutfu Timurtas’s carpet store. Lutfu had bought these fabrics from Bekir Ucar of Sivas, Saricicekli. He believed in and loved the fabrics and was very excited about them. I believe it was their first appearance in both Turkish and world markets. Purchasing the first 20-30 pieces from Lutfu was harder than pulling his teeth out. Lutfu was encouraged when some of the avant-garde carpet retailers bought the fabrics. He sent a message to collectors in Darendeli to gather more of these fabrics – Haydar Ozdemir was the one who worked the most. But this was not enough, so he also told the gatherers from Parcikanli, Malatya who are famous for their proficiency and diligence. Celal and Mehmet Kaplan from this village contributed great efforts. What these gatherers achieved was to go to the villages of Pomak origin and exchange these hand made textiles left from the villagers’ mothers and grandmothers with factory woven carpets, blankets and sell them in Istanbul to Lutfu and Muharrem Aslan for whatever price they could get. Their ambitions nourish these gatherers’ hard work and skills and help them to accomplish this occupation. Lutfu Timurtas’s and Muharrem Aslan’s skills come into terms at this point with a sensitivity that would make the conductors of New York Philharmonic jealous.

These fabrics are around 30-80 years old. They were either woven for personal use (pants, vests, jackets, coats, shepherd’s felt cloaks, underwear, shirts, dresses) or as home textiles (curtains, tablecloths, ground cloths, blankets, pillows, quilts, bed ticks). 8-9 thousand of these fabrics have been gathered. As far as I understood from the gatherer’s expressions and the way these textiles reached Istanbul, they were either left for moths in empty parts of the houses or left to rot in grandmother’s chests. Sometimes they were covering barn doors. I saw all 8-9 thousand fabrics one by one and they are mostly in fairly poor condition and I guess that the rest 200-300 thousand of them which are resting in the chests, rapidly vanishing are also in this condition. I leave the technical explanations of these fabrics to the textile technicians whom I hope pay attention and do research on these Pomak fabrics. 70% of these fabrics’ wefts are hand-combed and spun wool or wool and mohair and their warps are cotton and rarely wool. They are woven on Arab looms as they are called in Anatolia.

Babaeski – Buyukmandira village’s oldest lady (she did not show her age at all by the way) told me that there are 2 or 3 weavers in every village and that the preparation of the material needs time and care. These families used to keep sheep and goats until 20-30 years ago when the sparkling lights of the big cities began appearing on TV and newspapers. Then the ‘boys’ left for the cities to become civil servants, drivers or to be unemployed where as the girls grow up hearing “ they don’t work, they just sit like a lady.” And the elderly villagers continued to chitchat with the last of the goats. Nobody knows whether the goats or the elderly died first. But the result is, as in most villages of Turkey, the is “East” is gone, but “West” did not replace. Instead “labels”, “pills”, “well-informed and bearded shrinks”, “204 billion dollars foreign loan”, “gyms to lose weights” surrounded us.

There are not only Pomak textiles in Turkey. The importance of these rotten or almost rotten fabrics in all houses from Edirne to Kars lies here. These fabrics may not be graphically splendid or powerful in colors (except some), but in each of them you can see the weaver’s love. French or Japanese, in 20 years I never saw anyone touching these fabrics and not falling in love with them.

What attracted Lutfu Timurtas to these textiles was first of all his inner love’s reflection to the textiles.

Today some of these textiles can be used in both domestic and foreign markets. They need finishing and a good wash. The rest, after getting rid of the rotten parts, can be used for Halil-Ibrahim (patchwork). With minor changes these can burst into both the men’s and women’s fashion worlds. Some of them can be turned into home textiles that are used in the cities. Bags, shoes, hats, etc. can be created. 4-5 million dollars in a year, totally 180-200 million dollars of income can be profited.

I carry out works like this in 21 years. What I estimated above can be achieved if firms like mine multiply. It is possible to weave these fabrics again. If they become trendy in other countries, the old ones won’t be enough. It would be needed to weave the new ones as in carpets and kilims. I do and will do as a profession what I explained here, but this field is so wide that many carpet retailers, fashion makers, home textile makers can profit. At such a time when the sector is so narrowed, these felts, covers, beds and mattresses are like a financial aid.