Our story began in 1964, when Barbara Sansoni, an artist was invited to design for women learning to weave at a convent weaving centre.   

Barefoot, the company she founded continues to this day, and we work in four weaving centres outside Colombo, three of them in the countryside. It has been important to us that we take work to where it is needed rather than having people travelling to work. We make every effort to use all the cloth we weave. We strive for zero wastage of material that has been dyed and woven. Any remnant piece of fabric, however small, is used for further secondary production.

We designed and built from scratch on an ideal property the centre where we not only weave, but most importantly run our own dye plant and its adjacent water treatment centre. We care about our carbon footprint and environmental impact and have invested heavily in a Central Environmental Authority certified water treatment plant.

At our dye plant, we have succeeded with trials that allow us to obtain the maximum colour from a dye bath. This process is now in use and produces a further range of colour different to all the rest. It is beautifully located and hides under a canopy of forest trees with natural lotus ponds at the entrance.

Barefoot uses Novacron reactive dyes to dye our wonderful coloured yarn which we then handweave into the fabric you are so familiar with. Our dyes are certified with the highest textile compliance standard of Blue Sign (ZDHC level 3/ Zero discharge of Hazards chemicals), Okoeotex, GOTS (Global organic textile standards). Thereby driving long term environmental sustainability.