Bag

A flat rectangular bag (kete muka) made from New Zealand Flax, in undyed fibre. There is a wide fringe around three sides on the back and front, and two plaited fibre handles in dark and pale fibre, with tassels at each end. This bag was made by finger-weaving or twining and the main technique is double-pair twining, which forms the wefts (aho). This began at the top edge with a selvedge, and finished at the bottom where the warp threads (whenu) were left loose, and are covered by the fringes. There are six warps per cm, and the wefts are 9 mm apart. The fringe threads are joined by a line of single-pair twining and sewn onto the bottom and side edges. There is one fringe on the back of the bag and one on the front. Over most of bag every fifth warp cross over four others in pairs between the wefts, forming a cross-diagonal pattern. Three rows on the front and back are left plain.