Chilkat apron on the left and a photograph of the weaver demonstrating on the right.

NAAXEIN • NAAXIIN • GWISHALAAYT • CHILKAT WEAVING

Thunderbird Apron

by Maria Ackerman Miller (Tlingit), circa 1992
Loan Courtesy Ed Hotch LC.488

Maria Miller Weaving a Chilkat Robe
Cleveland Museum of Art, 1990. Photo courtesy Cleveland Museum of Art Archives E15213.

Early in the history of Chilkat weaving, weavers developed a technique for making aprons for dancing. Adding warps along the bottom edge at center produced a gracefully sweeping bottom edge edge, leaving room for crests in the middle, and high on the sides for freedom of movement. This apron, by the late Haines weaver, Maria Ackerman Miller, of the L’uknaxh.ádi represents a thunderbird—a gigantic, supernatural eagle-like bird that nests on mountain tops.