'Chimok' Sambae-maeul
CHIMOK Sambae-maeul
Welcome to Chimok village, Goemok-ri. Jeoksang-myeon, Muju-gun, Jeonlabuk-do, South Korea. This village, which is designated as a hemp cloth village, is a noted one where the villagers are kindhearted and live very happily together as ii they were the members of one united family.
The members of the homemakers association, who cooperate to weave the hemp textiles. are well solidated with each other. Around 50 members of the homemakers association weave the hemp textiles, which are the special product of this village. They weave the textiles during the off-season and the village earns around 20 million won per year from this business.
You can see the beautiful village, Chimok. as going down toward a standing signboard saying 'Sambe-maeul’ (Hemp Cloth village) on the right walking along a new road leading to Muju Resort.
It is called ‘Bae' or ‘Mapo’ (Hemp Cloth) and they are made with the best fibers, which are collected from the Phloem (the inner bark) of hemp skins. In Korea, those have been used as the raw materials for clothing or bedding since the Korean ancient kingdom, Gojoseon.
(2333 B.C. — 108 B.C.) A hemp cloth does not absorb or discharge moisture quickly and have the antibiosis and antitoxity, which block ultraviolet rays and restrain fungi. In addition, Due to the excellent firmness and durability, the hemp fibers are used to make ropes, nets and tires, etc., as well as textiles.
First of all, a hemp fiber has the longest staple length, around 4~5cms, among natural fibers and it has a feature 10 times as durable as a cotton yarn. Therefore, it was used to make a rope for a ship in the past and is widely used as a raw material for automobile tires or plastics in these days. In addition, the bast or stark of hemp is used as a raw material for paper pulp. In this case, the papers made of wood pulp can be recycled 3 or 4 times, while the papers made of hemp pulp can be recycled around 7 times.
A hemp fiber has the very unique structure that many empty long pipes are entangled with each other numerous times like a web. Therefore, due to this structural feature of this fiber, it is said that hemp fabrics have the features to automatically control the amount of moisture and heat as well as the moisture absorption and discharge rate 10times as fast as cotton ones and sound-proofness, etc. On the other hand, due to this feature of hemp fabrics, it is known to us that those are the fabrics for summer, but it is known to foreigners that those are the fabrics for four seasons for health of human beings since they are cool in summer and have an excellent heat-retaining property in winter.
These features of hemp fabrics are also related to the structural features. For example, fungi, which vigorously thrive under the damp condition, cannot inhabit in the condition of hemp fibers, which have a special structure due to the amazing capability to discharge moisture. (Due to a dry condition all the time)
These functions are originated from the structural feature of hemp fibers and, referring to an experiment, it was found out that these fibers block ultraviolet rays by around 99.9% and the electromagnetic waves from cellular phones are blocked by around 86%.