Production of the material includes several stages: silk floss is spun into yarn by hand, with patterns added by hand-tying bundles of yarn before dyeing the yarn with indigo, then the silk is woven using a back-tension loom.
Lanvin eschewed the restrictive silhouettes of those clothes and made loose dresses for Marguerite to allow for easy movement, but she used the most luxurious fabrics silk taffeta, gold-spun lace, diaphanous chiffon and liberally embellished her designs with intricate folk-inspired embroidery, silk flowers, lace ribbons and lots of ruffles.
In her workshop at the Limerick Craft Hub, she showed me how the technique just involves a strip of silk, some lengths of spun wool, some water and a couple of hand sanders.