LOOMS & WEAVING FESTIVAL
7 - 8 - 9 AUGUST, IERAPETRA
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Explore our upcoming event:
The Looms & Weaving Festival is a three-day cultural initiative that explores weaving as an evolving form of intangible heritage — one that connects memory, embodied knowledge and contemporary practice.
Held in Ierapetra, on the southeast coast of Crete, the festival brings together intergenerational communities, artisans, educators, artists and researchers around the loom: not only as a technical tool, but as a space for transmission, dialogue and reinvention.
From tradition to activation
This is not a festival of museum objects. Weaving here is live, shared and re-claimed. a process that unfolds through hands-on stations, children's workshops, open looms, curated exhibitions, lectures, screenings, and artistic encounters.
The programme includes:
Daily public weaving on floor and table looms
A workshop for children aged 6–12 (“My First Weaving”)
A symbolic opening ritual known as “the hanging of thewarp”, led by practitioners from the village of Kritsa
Masterclasses by acclaimed weaver Manolis Kouratoras (advanced techniques and production pathways)
Inkle loom workshop with Zoi Papadaki (band-making, translocal techniques)
A lecture on Cretan pattern iconography by Popi Siganou
Film screenings from Iran and Syria on women and thread
A hidden treasure game for children using riddles, loom parts and imagination
Public forum on cultural transmission titled “Invisible Labor, Visible Art”
A full-moon closing performance with weaving, dance, projection and traditional song
All activities are free and open to the public.
They take place at the Mikrasiaton Association and the 2nd Experimental Primary School of Ierapetra.
Interwoven themes
At the heart of the festival lie the threads of:
intergenerational learning
community-rooted creation
female knowledge transmission
resistance to cultural erosion
rethinking heritage as a shared, open and transformative field
This initiative positions the loom as both an archive and a stage, where past techniques meet present questions and future potentials. In a world shaped by speed and disposability, the festival affirms the urgency and relevance of slow, crafted, collective forms of making.
Local roots, shared grounds
The festival is organized by ECCE!
It is realized in collaboration with a diverse range of partners:
the social cooperative To Ksobli (Kritsa)
the Weaving School in Anogeia (under the University of West Attica Lifelong Learning Center)
the Municipality of Anogeia
the creative hub Ergastini
and local cultural associations working to keep weaving practices alive on the island.
The organisation is held under the auspices and with the essential support of the Municipality of Ierapetra
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