Peacock tea service
Fifteen pieces, a peacock on every one, and more gold than anything else we have.
$117
Everything we make, and the people who made it.
Twenty-four objects from six workshops. Every one is named, weighed and traced to the town it came from, because that is the difference between a gift and a souvenir.
Cream scalloped bowls, set of six
Six deep bowls with a scalloped rim and forty years of wear along the edge.
$30
Blue lattice bowls, set of six
Cobalt at the rim fading to white at the centre, over a moulded lattice.
$30
Wave-rim soup plates, set of three
A rippled rim, an orange line, and a dark edge that was painted by hand.
$20
Pale blue side plates, set of three
A soft grey-blue, a scalloped edge, and no pattern to get tired of.
$15
Rose and gilt tea service
A full service for six, gold on every rim, for the price of two cups new.
$15
Rosaline glass cups and saucers
Pressed pink glass, swirled underneath, and completely transparent in daylight.
$8
Carrom board
The game every Sri Lankan street plays, on a board that has already been played on.
$11
Roll-up chess set
A vinyl board and a full set of pieces, in a tube, for taking somewhere.
$10
Framed chess board
Sixty-four squares in a dark frame, and no pieces at all.
$7
Cycling helmet and sunglasses
A vented road helmet with mirrored wraparounds hooked into the front.
$13
Cricket ball
Red leather, six rows of stitching, and a seam that does the actual work.
$4
Dumbara rata kalala runner
Three weeks on a pit loom in Thalagune, in a pattern held only in the weaver's head.
$340
Meetiyagoda moonstone drops
Blue-sheen moonstone from the one pit in Meetiyagoda that still produces it.
$210
Matale lacquer bangles
Colour melted on at speed, then lined with a thumbnail while still turning.
$130
Kaluwara serving bowl
Ceylon ebony, dense enough to blunt a chisel in an afternoon.
$260
Thalagune handloom throw
Plain weave, two stripes, and a fringe knotted by hand at both ends.
$180
Ratnapura blue sapphire ring
One stone, out of gravel that has been worked by hand for two thousand years.
$480
Lacquer writing box
A flat box in three lac colours, lined in bare wood so it still smells of the tree.
$295
Indigo handloom sarong
The check is woven from dyed thread, not printed on afterwards.
$96
Kosgoda garden black tea
Low-grown leaf from a slope behind one house, rolled by hand the day it was picked.
$32
Home garden spice tin
Seven whole spices out of one garden, none of them ground.
$26
Ceylon cinnamon quills
True cinnamon — pale, layered and brittle. Not the thick red curl sold as cassia.
$18
Batik napkins, set of four
Four napkins, one dye bath, and the crackle that proves nobody printed them.
$42
Coir market basket
Coconut husk, soaked three months, twisted into rope and coiled into a basket.
$48
Riverbank clay water jug
Unglazed, and deliberately so — it sweats, and the sweating is what cools the water.
$38
Batik wall cloth, heron
A pond heron in three dyes, drawn backwards in hot wax before any colour went on.
$58
Wooden elephant
Carved thick on purpose — legs a child cannot snap off.
$34
Tiny handloom sarong
The same cloth as the grown-up one, with an elastic waist so it stays on.
$44
Cotton turtle
Eyes embroidered, not buttons. Nothing on it can come off.
$28
Wooden stacking rings
Turned on the same lathe as the bangles, in the same four colours.
$52
First batik blanket
One dye bath only, at half strength, so it is pale from the first day.
$72
Dumbara ceremonial hanging
Nine weeks, four patterns, and the only piece of its size she makes in a year.
$1,400
Moonstone collar necklace
Nineteen stones cut so the sheen lifts across all of them at the same angle.
$980
Carved ebony turtle
Thirteen scutes, because that is how many a green turtle has.
$420
Lacquer chest
The largest thing that will fit on the lathe, and then some.
$760
