UNESCO application offers hope for Da Vinci’s lace-makers

Some of Cyprus’ intangible cultural traditions are under threat, MELISSA REYNOLDS talks to some tradition bearers.


Satisfying a tourist market that demands an idyllic rural lifestyle experience within a fast-growing modern economy has become somewhat of a paradox for Cyprus. For villages like Lefkara, renowned for a centuries-old tradition of producing distinctive handmade ‘Lefkaritiko’ lace, significant social and economic evolution is making this picture-postcard image increasingly difficult to maintain.

The pretty hilltop village of Lefkara has enjoyed a long history of prosperity, its fortunes founded on the embroidery skills learned from visiting Venetian noblewomen in the 15th century. Celebrity endorsement includes that of Leonardo Da Vinci who paid the village a visit in 1481, departing with an embroidered altar cloth destined for the cathedral of Milan. The ‘potamos’ or ‘Da Vinci’ design remains popular with today’s lace-makers, still using similar tools and occupying the same positions as those of their mothers, grandmothers and distant ancestors before them.

Cheap imports, tourism decline and changing tastes in decorative arts have left village industries struggling, yet perhaps the greatest threat to the longevity of experience and craftsmanship is the ambivalence of a younger generation who favour city life and professional careers over the old ways.

If you’ll excuse the pun, the survival of Lefkaritiko heritage hangs by a thread as most of today’s lace-makers and craftsmen are now in their senior years and have few, if any, younger recruits to whom they can pass on their skills.

When the tourist buses descend these canny grandmothers never miss a sales opportunity and once they have your attention it is almost impossible to resist or escape the ensuing onslaught of quick-fire sales patter that invariably leverages the Da Vinci connection, along with an insistent invitation to browse the in-store display of a cousin or brother-in-law’s hand crafted jewellery. Lace traders occupy almost all of Lefkara’s narrow streets, every window and door festooned with machine-made Chinese imports alongside traditionally produced lacework.

To the untrained eye the famous motifs may look the same, but the touch and feel of hand stitching on finest Belfast linen along with the odd error or two are all indications of the genuine article. Criticised as wanton commercialism, shop owners say they are merely providing customers with an affordable alternative; ignorance and price resistance leave many visitors none the wiser that their prized souvenir is nothing more than a cheap imitation.

Shop owner Christopher, 69, returned to the village to retire after four decades in London. Relaxing in the shade while his wife, Anastasia, works on her embroidery, he explains how to spot the real Lefkaritiko, “If you look very carefully you find mistakes, otherwise it is not handmade. Here you see you don’t find any mistakes,” he says pointing to the machine-made imitation, “Some people come in and don’t have a lot of money so we help them to buy something like this for €20 to make them happy”.

Chrys Komodromos operates from a small alley-way shop that was once home to the local blacksmith, a business that thrived in her husband’s family for generations. Born in Lefkara at a time when lace making and silk worm production were still de rigueur, Chrys moved to the UK with her family before her teens, returning to Cyprus after her marriage.

Today she is one of the more fortunate ladies in the trade, her overheads are low and she needs only to sell what she can in order to survive, the rest is kept for next season, “I know some of the shops owe several months rent but we’ve had good times and they will come again, we’re survivors here,” she says.

She admits that there is little incentive to enter into the lace business, “You can’t make a living from making lace and whilst it’s OK for us housewives – it keeps us out of mischief and a little bit of pin money is better than nothing – we have no other remunerative occupation here.”

As is common in Cyprus, her children are all university educated, an indication of changing aspirations, “For the young ones it’s not the same thing, they move to town and get proper work for proper money. They go to colleges and universities and come back professional women. We’ve even had doctors in this new generation; Lefkara women becoming doctors is a big deal.”

Chrys, like many of the lace-makers, is concerned about the future of the Lefkaritiko, “What we are really worried about is that the lace will die a natural death because nobody of the new generation is willing to take it on,” she warns.

A similar fate awaits ‘The Beautiful Lefkara,’ a local family-run producer of ‘loukoumia’. The small business produces less than 2,000 boxes of the sweet treat every week, operating from an unmarked shop-front factory on Lefkara’s main street. Little has changed since the present owner’s grandfather and namesake established the business in 1895 and for more than a century the factory and the secret family recipe for the delicately flavoured Cyprus Delight has been passed from father to son.

Theodorou Krambidou believes he has a distinct advantage over his mass-producing rivals, “Factories make around a hundred items but I make only delights, nothing else. I have one hundred years experience behind me and I think it is better,” he claims. “My father taught me, my grandfather taught my father. How I make it, it is not a case of throwing some ingredients in the fire and it’s finished. You must work many years to learn.”

Over the clatter of machinery Theodorou admits that his retirement may herald the end of the line for the 115 year-old business, “I think I am the last because my son, my children, they are not interested,’ he says, “I don’t know, I believe maybe it (the business) will stop.”

For decades a slow exodus of villagers have sought their fortunes overseas, leaving homes shuttered, locked and slowly decaying in the extreme Mediterranean climate. Others have cashed in on the island’s property boom, finally selling derelict land and homes to the steady influx of downsizing foreigners eager to invest in a more tranquil pace of life.

Standing above a harsh but wildly beautiful landscape Lefkara’s network of cobbled alleyways and thoroughfares converge on a square dominated by the imposing bell tower of the 14th century Church of the Holy Cross. Potted palms and unruly bougainvillea add colour to streets framed by imposing Ottoman and Neo Classical homes built in the style of various invaders or inspired by the travels of lace merchants in the early twentieth century.

In 1979 the Department of Antiquities declared many of these architectural gems ‘ancient monuments’ later designating a large ‘controlled’ area for their permanent protection. Since then, several successful restoration programs have been implemented although the village is still dotted with the cracked and neglected ruins of once-grand facades.

Taverna owner, Adam Achilleoudis, is one of several villagers who did fulfil a promise to return. During a thirty-five year stint in Johannesburg the gravitational lure of the home he left at the age of eighteen was never far from his mind. “I feel like I never left this place, I feel like I have belonged to it all my life,” he says, “I owed it to myself to spend the last years of my life in my village”.

The ‘Adamos’ taverna is a shrine to Lefkara’s cottage-industry heyday, offering a far more insightful tableaux of the past than the local folklore museum. Traditionally costumed manikins and an eclectic collection of industrial tools, handmade pots, presses and gourds are among the treasures Adam has rescued from local rubbish bins.

A tattered, yellowed envelope bearing a faded 1924 postmark and a series of handwritten addresses in Melbourne, Sydney and Toowoomba is one of several souvenirs and letters documenting the travels of Adam’s uncle, Adamos Tsangarides. At a time when travel to Australia was an almost inconceivable notion Adamos enjoyed some success in his long-distance market, however his company, ‘Tsangarides Lace & Embroidery’ is now part of Lefkara’s history. “It’s all gone. Everything that doesn’t move dies,” explains Adam, “Unless they create new jobs so new people can make their living it’s a matter of time to die,” he says of Lefkara’s future.

‘Adamos’ is one of only two tavernas remaining in Lefkara. Its clientele, a casually dressed tourist couple and a smattering of weatherworn locals, are a far cry from the museum’s sepia-toned images of dapper gentlemen enjoying the relatively decadent village lifestyle of the 1940’s. Back then, affluent Lefkara residents had no less than twenty-five kafenas and tavernas to frequent.

In the village centre, dust gathers in the foyer of the ‘Agora’ hotel, the latest victim of the economic crisis having recently closed its doors after fifteen years in business. Just down the street Serbian artist Alex and his Russian partner Anna are filling the gap left in the market, adding the finishing touches to a €100K refurbishment of the old ‘Lefkarama Village’ hotel.

The revamped ‘boutique’ hostelry aims to preserve village heritage with a modern twist; after eleven years in Cyprus Alex knows exactly the ambience he needs to capture, “I like Lefkara because it’s not ‘vitrina’ (a facade),” he explains, “I think it’s important for tourists to see what Cyprus really is. I know how people like to go to Larnaca and they go to the North side because it’s still, you know, pure, and this is the reason they come here”.

With little money to be made from the lace making profession the ladies of the village are resigned to the possibility that theirs is a dying art, but there is hope. At the end of this month UNESCO will announce whether an application by the Education and Culture Ministry to place Lefkaritiko on the ‘Intangible Cultural Heritage’ list has been successful.

Lefkara’s Mayor, Andreas Soseilos, hopes that the decision will assist the Municipality’s existing application for UNESCO funding to establish an independent foundation to ensure continuation of lace production and promotion, including classes in traditional needlework and lace techniques.

Their timing is crucial, particularly if they are to find participants willing to spend years mastering the skills while the experts are still around to pass on their knowledge.
Without it Lefkara may simply fade into rural simulation, its real heritage and tradition sadly consigned to the past.