GUT PARKA DESIGN

The design of gut parkas varies by intended use, community, and family.

Three main groups in Alaska show regional trends:

• In the far north, Saint Lawrence Island and Inupiaq parkas include the billowing Bering Strait style, and often have vertical seams and running stitch construction in common.
• Yup’ik, Cup’ik, and Cup’ig parkas of western Alaska typically have grass reinforcement along the seams, spiral construction around the torso, and a gut strip extending from wrist to wrist over the hood.
• North Pacific Unangax, Alutiiq/Sugpiaq and Athabascan parkas frequently share a double-couched stitch, embellishments of colorful yarn in the seams, tall necks, or may be hoodless.

Museums have few gut parkas from the Eyak, Tligit, Haida, and Tsimshian cultures of southeast Alaska who rarely used this material during the 20th century.

Through exchange of ideas, trade, intermarriage, blended families, and population movements over time, individual parkas sometimes show unique combinations of features from multiple cultures.