11/19/2023 0 Comments Linen burial shrouds![]() “She’s great at talking to grieving people, where I would probably just cry.” “I’m not opposed to it, but I kind of like the distance,” Whiteley explains. The families of the departed, who are encouraged to personalize the shrouds with flowers, notes, and other compostable items, know Whiteley only through her work she prefers to let Motley handle the emotional aspects of funeral arrangements. The range of colors is limited but appropriate: natural, white, moss green, and a jacquard. She frays the edges of the salvaged linen by hand, a subtle reminder of mortality, and uses the extra fabric to make a small pillow on which the deceased’s head can rest. Photo by Jack Sorokinīut beyond its function, Whiteley’s design is also beautiful in its simplicity. Shrouded House urges clients to personalize their pieces with notes, flowers, and simple mementos. Using a few carefully chosen long stitches, she created a way to change the length of the shroud as needed by folding or stretching a section of the fabric, then tuck the remaining sides into a neat, compact covering. Whiteley describes her eventual solution, which she sells under the name Shrouded House, as an adjustable burrito. “I have lots of pictures of him in shrouds, but I made him smile in all of them,” she says. Over a period of several weeks, she experimented with different patterns, often using her husband as a model for the works in progress. “If you have a man who’s six-foot-five and weighs 300 pounds, and then you have a teenage girl, how do they both fit in the same thing?”Īlthough out of the fashion business for some time - she runs Fleetwood’s vintage shop and wedding chapel and the Asheville Flea for Y’all with her husband, Simon - Whiteley decided to take up the challenge. ![]() “She was getting other people to make shrouds at the time, and she told me that it was a real issue,” Whiteley recalls. Motley’s business markets supplies for “green” burial: cardboard coffins and biodegradable linen shrouds that help people reduce their environmental impact even after their death. Could she make a garment that was truly one size fits all: a burial shroud? The shrouds come in a range of peaceful natural colors. ![]() Whiteley was therefore intrigued by the problem posed a couple of years ago by her longtime friend Carol Motley, co-owner of Mourning Dove Studio/Bury Me Naturally in West Asheville. Carter & Sons denim, she turned out clothing that flattered a wide variety of female forms First for Young Generations, a maker of youth dresses in Hendersonville, and then for H.W. In her former career as a fashion designer and pattern maker, Christi Whiteley faced the daily task of tailoring fabric to size. Christi Whiteley, left, and Carol Motley offer a soft landing for the business of death.
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