You can see the flaps in this picture:
Tibetans do that, too
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I had meant, the purpose of the frame is to hold cloth layers together while sewing. I hadn’t been clear in my own head which layers I meant, oops.
I have reflected on your comment, which is also correct, and I feel the step in robe construction where a frame is helpful is later, after the initial joining of pieces, to join the layers i.e. to make a double layer sanghati, etc. This is how I have seen videos of quilting frames being used.
I think that other commentors are correct…the method of sewing the sanghati with joined internal seams is degenerate.
It would be possible to construct a double or multi-layer sanghati from two individual layers without joined internal seams with techniques similar to how a frame is used in frame and long arm quilting today.
The sanghati I received at ordination was too short and I have nice brown cloth, so I will be making up another one this year using your suggested method and without degenerate seams.
But I am too scared to line it with a second layer because I don’t think I can get the lining to lie properly flat without a frame. So in true city nun style, it will only be a single layer sanghati until I can find, um, the cheapskate version of this (likely involving some planks, clamps and chairs): https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=t6rtPL8Az_Q
I am therefore increasingly convinced that this is how frames come into things. Unfortunately, while I am competent with general sewing, I have no experience with frames.
I also now thoroughly believe that the modern robe making technique with cut kusis evolved (i.e. was probably invented by tailors) from the method you have shown to reduce the bulky doubling of fabric in the seams, which is slower to air dry. The Chinese and Tibetan degenerate “open flap” system likely evolved that way for the same reason.
Thank you for your comments! I am now a convert to the Bhante @Snowbird school of robe making.
Well, keep in mind the robe isn’t ever going to lie flat once it has been made. I think the layers would have to be really out of whack for anyone to be able to notice. Remember, this is sewing, not carpentry. 
That was what I thought too, the last time I messed up my sanghati.
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The method I’ve used for my sanghati and for the most recent one we sewed here was quite easy to get the layers to line up.
It’s documented in the ticivara guide but here is the basic outline.
- cut each panel and sew the horizontals. You’ll have 18/14 panels
- number them 1a, 1b, 2a, 2b etc
- take the centre panels (5a, 5b on a 9 panel robe) and join them along the horizontal kusi, (from the inside is easiest)
- Place the next 2 panels (4a, 4b) on top and underneath - right sides facing the right side of the centre panel and stitch along the seam allowance. We also overlocked for extra strength but if you’re hand sewing you’d do an overlap in the Bhante Snowbird™ style if you were worried about fraying.
-keep going, working outwards in the same sandwichy manner.
If the width of your cloth allows you could do ‘fake’/non-cut vertical kusis for some of the panels and join them the way that the horizontal centre join is done.
I was thinking about the frame the other day, while I was darning using a lacrose ball as my darning mushroom. I thought it might actually be useful to have the length of cloth stretched across the frame just to keep it flat. You’d still want to pin it, but the tension in the cloth would be even.
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There is some discussion of the original method of sanghati construction in one of the ancillary texts in the Chinese canon, in a work by Daoxuan. He expresses doubt in the method of sanghati construction in his days and gives a method that was revealed to him by a deity.
Unfortunately, I couldn’t quite work out the method, but one day I will share it.
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Wow! I heard of some Thai forest monks making claims like this. It’s so cool to have proof of its longer history !
I was playing around with hand sewing some patches together from my dyeing experiments. Maybe one day they will form a rag robe.
In the process I thought I would play around with kusis/joins as per the OP.
Firstly, you use up a lot of cloth if you are doing fat flat felled seems… I didn’t have much to spare, so mine are skinny.
Secondly, the kusi doesn’t sit lower/higher than the field. It just steps down from one field to the other. This sort of bugs me. But I guess it’s just my conditioning from seeing Thai style robes.
I don’t really see the advantage in doing the overlapping kusi method. Sure, you can still cut the panels into 5ths/7th… but a skinny joining flat felled seem and a ‘fake seem’ for the other side of the kusi seems like it would use less material and still be as strong?
While stitching I was also wondering what the point on the horizontal kusi was? Could it have been that the width of cloth/loom was such that for an upper robe it was not enough to do a full height and this is the more economical way to draw and cut on the cloth? This seems unlikely as it seems rich lay folks had single pieces of cloth for upper garments. Thoughts?
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Maybe just to reduce the value of the cloth? I think, in general, that the kusis add overall reinforcement to the garment, though.
My idea is just that the concept of putting a fake/decorative seam into the garmet doesn’t feel like something monastics would have been doing. But we are so conditioned by these Thai robes that it feels natural now. Especially the whole summer/winter Mahanikay/Dhammayut “stars upon thars” thing. I just wonder how we would think about these things if our whole monastic lives hadn’t been literally wrapped up in perfectly geometric robes.
Thanks so much for sharing your work, especially the photos!
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That’s how I felt when I was shown for the first time how to sew a robe Thai style. I felt almost immoral!
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