Somali Alool Weaving Project Brings Common Threads to Dublin

“There is something special about moments in the city centre that are not about buying something,” Malaika Cunningham said.

At about 4pm on Tuesday afternoon, a group of people gathered in a brightly lit room in The Liberties to practice Alool weaving, The Journal reported. The traditional Somali nomadic method involves weaving strips of textile material lengthwise around upright sticks to form colourful walls.

Waste wool supplied by Botanic Weavers, Avoca Handweavers, and Foxford Woolen Mills in Mayo provided the raw textile strips. Pedestrians walked past the glass exterior, while others stepped inside to join the work.

Saada Osman, a Somali woman and community organiser based in Sheffield, led the weaving process alongside members of the Higsad Alool Weavers. Osman works with The Bare Project, an artistic group in Sheffield that has run an outdoor Common Threads project on a busy shopping street for three years.

“And then we can do the different things inside the living room,” Osman told The Journal, explaining that the space hosts artist workshops, storytelling, singing, and eating food. At the conclusion of the festival, the structure is dismantled entirely.

Cunningham, artistic director with The Bare Project, noted the value of spaces focused on interpersonal exchange. Artist Jennie Moran invited the Common Threads project to bring the installation to the gallery space at the National College of Art and Design.

Moran operates through an artistic practice centred on hospitality and shared connection. She previously ran the NCAD café Luncheonette and is undertaking a residency at NCAD Field.

“I am always talking about hospitality not as an industry or not as anything related to hotels… but this crazy ill-advised system that humans in every single corner of the earth have created for welcoming strangers,” Moran told The Journal.

This marked the first time Common Threads has travelled outside of Sheffield. Moran pointed out that time remains one of the scarcest resources individuals can offer.

“So for people to offer time to collectively do something like that together, which is making a shelter… I find that very profound,” Moran told The Journal.

Moran described the initial Dublin setup phase as “pure joy.” Students and solo visitors dropped in, including two friends who spent the whole evening talking while weaving.

The three-day gentle festival of welcome included talks, events, and storytelling from Traveller storyteller Oein de Bhardún. Outside the gallery windows, traffic moved along Thomas Street while police managed protests near Trinity College.