Early this year,
I volunteered to assist with the conservation of some very special textiles, housed in temple collections in Chiang Mai. These intricate hangings were associated with Queen Consort Princess Darasamee and very much needed preservation. But it turns out they were far more complex than the visible embroidery threads for they were tied into the threads of my own life, and much like in a fairy tale, they awakened the happiness of my childhood.
Once upon a time…
Beautiful trees surrounded our compound.
Once upon a time, when I was a child, I lived in a magical house in the Borneo Company Compound in Chiang Mai, Thailand. The house had belonged to Louis Leonowens, the son of Anna Leonowens, who was the tutor in the Court of Siam (The King and I). When Louis returned to Siam as a young man in the 1880’s, King Rama V Chulalongkorn, a childhood friend, granted him commercial teak rights up north.
The house became the center of the famed and lucrative Borneo Trading Company, which felled teak and sent it down river to Bangkok for export. A grand home made of solid teak, in a colonial Indo Portuguese style, it was elevated on stilts and fronted by a pair of staircases with carved balusters. It was known as ‘baan dam’ or the black house, decorated
in classic ‘gingerbread’ carved wood, with long runs of louvered plantation shutters. There were no screens or glass, and the air and rain swept through like natural air conditioning. So did the bugs, spiders, snakes, monkeys, and reptiles…. many a gecko lived there, and as children we always counted the number of calls hoping to hear the gecko stop on the lucky number.
The house was so big that we all slept in one bedroom. The large extension on the back of the house, once the minor wives quarters, we converted into a pottery studio, puppet theatre, and guest rooms. The dining room had two fridges – one was full of bottles of boiled and charcoal filtered water, in frosted Gilbey Gin bottles. Our kitchen was so far away that the food was cold by the time it reached the dining room. We had scores of cats and dogs, and our pet cemetery was at the bottom of the kitchen steps.
My little brother and his pals were often found under the house, in their camouflage gear, driving mini jeeps and playing army games. Daily, like clockwork, the chokingly loud US bombers flew their sorties from Sathahip or Udorn airbases, over into Vietnam, Lao and Cambodia, and returned again. How eerie, to think that a major war was going on, a shroud over our charmed daily life.
We never wanted to leave the Borneo Compound. Our life there was heaven. The compound held several houses and we had a gang of friends who were Thai, Austrian, German, Scottish, and French. We walked to our little school, Chiang Mai Coeducational Center. We raced our bikes all over the compound, chased after the hysterical honking geese, made our khatins parades, climbed the many lamyai longan, banyan and mimosa trees around our house, and sometimes went to tea at Miss Bain’s house, our landlady. We regularly held fashion shows, strutting through the spacious front rooms in the latest fashions (remember paper dresses?) my grandmother would send us from Kentucky.
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- Every year, Our beloved cook, Sri, spent months making a huge ‘gom loy’ or paper hot air balloon, out of tiny pieces of colored paper glued together with rice starch paste.
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- On Christmas morning, all our neighbors and friends came over to launch it.
Julia, and her sister Adik performed Thai dances for all the dinner parties, and sometimes got to meet Apasara, Miss Universe, who was the most beautiful person in the world.
…and so, my love for textiles was born.
It was from this home as a child, that I began to notice textiles and the differences between types of cloth. They were all around me everyday – woman’s pha sin skirts, hilltribe outfits, Yao embroidery, men’s plaid pah kah mah, elaborate dancing costumes, Jim Thompson silk, Design Thai, Lampang silks…. Getting a new dress meant going to the market and comparing all the bolts of bright cottons to select the perfect fabric to take to the tailor. Back at home, we spent hours painstakingly plotting out hill tribe cross-stitch patterns on graph paper in color pencils. In the steamy afternoons, we’d sit on the shaded verandas and work our embroidery – backstitch, blanket stitch, cross-stitch, satin stitch, seed stitch – or try tatting or crocheting. Our beloved nanny was always close by, ready to rescue when our threads snarled and knotted up.
Forlorn and falling down
In 2004, for the first time since 1970, our whole family returned to Chiang Mai. Our beloved Borneo House was in shambles, derelict. One staircase hung akimbo from the front of the house, along one side the outer walls had peeled back from the pillars, and large fig trees grew out of the roof. The back gardens were an impenetrable jungle of vines and weeds, and the house forlorn and abandoned. My family was so distressed that we even discussed whether we could buy and restore the house to its former beauty, a total pipe dream for us.
Beckoned home by a textile
This year, 2016, a twist of fate – a textile – called me to our old house, now beautifully restored and the heart of the new ‘137 Pillars Hotel Resort.’
In thanks for aiding the grassroots group “Conservation for Little People,” with the preservation of some important Chiang Mai textiles, the group graciously offered to put me up as a guest of 137 Pillars Hotel. Unbeknownst to them, I had spent my childhood there. Nervous, excited, I took a portfolio of old photos for the lovely owners, and over several days my childhood memories swelled and poured forth. Being there as an adult, in the glorious space where I had spent so many magic hours, I understood how deeply the places we love are woven into our being.
I am so grateful to the visionary owners for saving this special piece of Chiang Mai history.
Thanks for sharing this Julia. It brought back many fond memories of Thailand in the 1960’s. Maia
Julia now I know what karmic connection took you to the world of textiles and your love for Asia .your mission to weave lives and threads into magic .. to bring out its beauty.. is a blessing you have! Thanks for sharing this history
Wow Julia what a rich and wonderful story to be devoured as part of the Christmas feast.
Blessings on you
Love to read your bautiful story Julia. Textile is magic !
Lovely. Thanks for sharing.
From an enchanted childhood to a life’s work of giving enchantment to others with textiles! thanks to you, Julia!
This must rank high among your very many wonderful experiences. And how fortunate for the present owners to learn from you more about the history of their hotel.
Julia, thank you for sharing this. They have, indeed, lovingly restored your house and how wonderful things have come full circle. As both a colleague and a friend, I loved seeing your photos of the days when you and your family lived there. And to be able to work on pieces associated with Princess Dararasmi is very special. I love her museum in Chiang Mai. Wonderful how life often reconnects us with our past!
Wonderful story! Love it Julia❤ Merry Christmas????
This is such a beautiful story, Julia!
Wonderful story! Thanks for sharing it with us.
Julia — what charming memories of growing up in Chiang Mai. Thank you so much for sharing such idyllic and beautiful recollections that inspired your
art conserving textiles. Susie
You should write a book about your childhood! So many tales to tell!
I have memories of this beautiful house during 1973-75 when it was inhabited by John Dent-Young, a British professor teaching at Chiang Mai University. So happy to see this story!
You recreated an image of a more simple time when the beauty of textiles reflected the time people patiently took to make them. Thank you, Julia
How fortunate for you to have grown up there. Don’t think you look any different from your childhood self, except you are taller.
What a lovely happy transition for the compound.
Julia, what a wonderful story! Since I love historic buildings and work with them in Indonesia, my heart was in my throat when you described the dilapidated state the house was in when you and your family returned – thank goodness that the story has such a happy ending. If I ever go to Cheng mai I shall certainly visit the hotel it has now become. You know I always wondered what became of Mrs Leonowens’ son. (Jim Thompson disappeared when I was a child living in Malaysia – where he disappeared and I always wondered what happen to him too). Your story also really resonates with me because I had the chance to frequently stay in a somewhat similar house when I used to visit Singapore. It was one of those black and white colonial Tudor style houses on stilts on Mount Pleasant. Only the stilts had had walls attached so that it became a 2 story house. It is still my favourite style of house because it was simply beautiful and was so comfortable to live in. The house and garden were one and it had been built in a way to use nature to the benefit of the house. With its high ceilinged rooms and fans and many large windows and large cool garden with trees and the forest around – it really needed no air conditioning. I always slept with the windows open and fan going. It had such a serenity and calmness. How I miss that house. It was the house of my dreams….
Loved reading your magical story and seeing photos of you kids “as we knew you”. Thanks Julia
Your story is just magically nostalgic !
It really good Karma that brought you back to the Baan Dam.
Julia!! What an amazing and moving story! I loved reading about it, and imagining the scenes you so beautifully and fittingly wove for us into a vivid, descriptive tapestry… I loved every image, Julia. Thank you so much for this!
Thanks Julia for this wonderful post. This is the kind of story that could only happen to you- or in fiction. Everything is connected and textiles are often a key to this big mystery that is life. Much love and happy holidays!
Hi Julia,
This is your classmate from 6th grade in Miss Franzen’s class at CCC. I remember going to sleepovers at your beautiful home. I didn’t know it was a Borneo house and the connection to Anna Leonowens! Those were indeed magical days – I remember climbing the lamyai trees in our backyard too. I”m so glad you’re doing conservation of the amazing textiles of our childhood home. I make quilts now and have a small stash of Thai silks from a trip back there in 2007 that will become a memory quilt some day. I also have a few very small pieces of tribal (Akha) embroidery from about 50 years ago that I treasure. Blessings to you and your work in this New Year.
It is a lovely story, Julia. Thank you so much for sharing. I thanked Phyllis Kane in a note today for introducing us. Have a prosperous 2017! Marjorie
Lovely Julia – ❤️️