About us
We, Oscar and Tuss Almgren, have a great passion for silk. Maybe it is in the blood, because in 1860 Oscars great-great-grandfather smuggled a Jacquard loom out of France for his silk weaving mill in the south of Stockholm. The mill, K.A. Almgren Sidenväveri, was operating for 140 years until it was closed down in 1974.
In 1991 Oscar reawakened his great-great-grandfather's brainchild from her 17-year-long beauty sleep. He created a living museum where visitors could experience a piece of Swedish industrial history. The silk mill received under Oscar's management several prestigious assignments, including the hand-weaving of 160 m of a silk fabric called the "three crowns", for the Chinese salon at Drottningholm Palace. In 1995, Oscar was appointed as purveyor to the Royal Court of Sweden and he has received other prestigious cultural awards, such as The Magnolia Prize and St. Erik's Medal of Merit, for his work to revive the old silk mill.
EXHIBITION
Our silk exhibition on Gotland features unique 18th-century silk fabrics, bridal gowns, antique scarves and silk tapestries, as well as cocoons and silks from various silk moths such as cultivated mulberry silk and wild eri silk, muga and tussah silk. We have also put together a slideshow about the amazing properties of silk, and its production and history from China to Gotland.
Here you can see how we hand-weave silk on an old jacquard loom from 1860, and a shaft loom where we hand-weave thicker scarves and shawls in the wild silks tussah, muga and eri. We also weave wild silk fabrics into shirts and blouses on our industrial weaving machines.
At Sidengården, you can shop online and in our physical store
In our shop you will find quality products such as clothing of our own design in organic wild silk, knitwear and knitted sweaters in mulberry silk, muga silk and eri silk, and shawls and scarves in softest wool and cashmere.