Silk Factory, Chiang Mai

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On a day trip we stopped in many places and one of the amazing and interesting places to visit was the silk factory and shop. You can buy many different items made of silk, because dresses, shirts and other clothing etc

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There's an interesting silk place in the Golden Mile and they will take you through all the stages in making silk . It's really quite fascinating.

Every step of the process is by hand.

You are taken through the silk worm stage ( did you know the silk worm must die)...to the cocoon stage. The worm spins a continuous secretion of silk many times around its body. To remove the silk thread, the cocoon must be soaked in water for a period of time. It is removed by catching a thread and slowly spinning it on a spinning wheel. A silk-worker watches the thread and ties knots into any breaks that occur. This takes practically forever!

No wonder it's expensive to buy silk.

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We were a group of 34 travelling together and often hired a bus for the day and went to various sights, this day we spent a few hours at the Shinawatra Thai Silk Factory just outside Chiang Mai.It is a large complex and on arrival we were greeted in an opened sided building and presented with a refreshing fruit punch. The guide then took us into the old factory to see a demonstration of the old methods of harvesting the silk from silkworm cacoons, we then moved onto how they manually worked weaving machines which produced the silk cloth. Today modern machinery has taken over, increased production resulting in silk to be sold worldwide.There are many photos recording the history of modern silk, and the Shinawatra family boast having a former Prime Minister of Thailand.

There is a massive 2 floor retail building where you can buy everything that can be made in silk. My wife said the prices were very reasonable.

This is one of those touristy things that I usually don't like doing but I was very interested in the silk production. It was well worth visiting the factory to see the demonstration of how it all works. You do not have to buy anything but naturally, I did! The fabrics are beautiful so I couldn't resist.

It takes something like 2,000 cocoons to make 1 yard of silk fabric. The process is very interesting.