T-shirt WITH BULGARIA IN MY HEART - one wonderful idea! 

   The traditional Bulgarian embroidery is so beautiful, yet so distant to modern-day Bulgarians. There are only a few people who know it in detail and gladly immerse into the fascination of its colors and shapes. 

     What can be done to reintroduce this beauty to the everyday lives of the Bulgarians and foreigners enchanted by our folklore? We have decided to reproduce the Bulgarian embroidery with its authentic designs, colors and peculiar stitches on to a piece of everyday clothing—the tee-shirt. The patterns we use for our prints are genuine embroideries from shirts, vests, aprons and pinafore dresses representative of various ethnographic regions of our country. Craftswomen used to demonstrate their ability and feeling for beauty, harmony and color in the embroideries that decorated folk costumes.

     Besides individual artistry, each village, area or folklore region has its own specifics and characteristic traits in embroidery ornamentation and color choice. Thus, we can distinguish among the different ethnographic regions of Bulgaria—Thrace, Shopluk, Dobrudzha, Northern Bulgaria, Pirin and Rhodopes. Using tee-shirts and original designs we want to demonstrate to the world the eternal and inimitable beauty of the traditional Bulgarian embroidery. Through our works, we hope to preserve Bulgarian beauty in the lives of many people.

     Greetings from the creators of this idea!

     Iliana Bozhanova, Kiril Tarnarov and the Tifon print company.

     September 2010

     Plovdiv, Bulgaria