The name Barefoot represents what is spontaneous and in touch with the earth. Barefoot is about people. It is a story of simplicity. We are about the craft of weaving and the art of design. Our founder Barbara Sansoni’s designs of brilliant colour and simple geometry have given our cloth its internationally recognizable character.

In the early 1960s, Barbara Sansoni, an artist, was invited to design for women learning to weave in a convent workshop just north of Colombo. Today, Barefoot, the company she founded, has a band of dedicated designers providing training, designs, and raw materials. There are no factories and no production lines; each worker is responsible for the quality of his or her final product.

We primarily weave cotton (along with a small collection of silk and cotton cloth) from which we make furnishings, household linens and fine cloth for clothes. The rest of our workers are needlewomen who, from this hand-woven cloth make bags, clothes, soft furniture, linen, soft toys. There is no mass production line. We think that one of the contributions we make is that work is taken to where people live rather than have people travel to work.

Our cloth is hand woven in centers managed by us, and we run our own dye plant with its Central Environment Authority certified water treatment plant.

Our administrative staff form a core of disciplined professionals committed to integrating the creative work of our designers into smoothly functioning, professional workshops. Their contribution is no less important than the production staff.

We export our designs around the world under the name of Barbara Sansoni and sell locally as Barefoot.

Colour, in simple rectilinear proportions are the unpretentious characteristic of Barbara Sansoni’s style. Barefoot uses the inspiration of land and seascapes, earth, plants and animals of Sri Lankan in abstract geometry with vivid colour to produce beautiful and useful textiles. We can also be subtle and gentle in the way we use natural tones and just brilliant whites; we are diverse and quite unique.

The Barefoot experience, shop, art gallery, bookshop and courtyard cafe, offers you a kaleidoscope of colour, good design, wonderful art and delightful music – an oasis right in the centre of Colombo. We are also right in the middle of the Galle Fort, Galle.