Elke Schlüter-Bender

Elke Schlüter-Bender has been practicing this ancient craft for almost 40 years

Blueprinting has been her passion for almost 40 years. Elke Schlüter is one of the last people in Germany still practising this ancient craft. But the 62-year-old is not thinking of stopping. "I enjoy it too much for that."

When you enter the Blaudruckerei on Münsterstraße, you are immersed in another world. Time hasn't stood still here, but I have the feeling it runs slower here. No stress, no hectic pace. No machines, no computers. Even the group of women who are painting their objects in the ceramics workshop talk about relaxation. "Here you can calm down," they say.

Handcraft

Everything is done by hand in Elke Schlüter's blueprint workshop: from the design to sewing the fabric and printing. She explains to me how blue printing works. Elke Schlüter stamps the cardboard onto the fabric using models, as the large wooden blocks with the brass printing pieces on them are called. She has 800 samples of these models on her shelf. "The imprint of the color-revealing mass then ensures that the color is not absorbed in the dye bath and leaves a corresponding white pattern on the indigo-dyed fabric," says Elke Schlüter.

Blue wonder

In the back room is the large dyeing well into which the fabric is dipped. Sunk 2.20 meters into the ground and filled with 1500 liters of dye. "Original blue print is the blue round," explains Elke Schlüter. And you can literally experience a blue miracle: If you dip the cardboard-printed fabric into the dye bath and pull it out again after about 20 minutes, the fabric is initially yellowish-green and then slowly turns blue. "This color change was like a miracle for people in the 17th century. And that's how the saying came about: experiencing a blue miracle," explains Elke Schlüter.

The explanation is quite simple: indigo must first be reduced before it dissolves in water. In layman's terms, an oxygen particle has to be removed from the dye. It then combines with water and colors the fabric yellow. It then recovers the oxygen particle when exposed to air. The oxidation turns the substance blue.

"Stupid job"

How did she get into blue printing? "Through a stupid job," Elke Schlüter recalls with a laugh. During her design studies, she worked part-time as a seamstress for a lecturer. At the time, this lecturer had a blue print shop in Billerbeck. At the time, however, she was not at all keen on an order. She was supposed to print 100 placemats. "Elke, why don't you do it," she said. And Elke Schlüter did it so well that she opened her own blue print shop a short time later. First in Nordkirchen and then in 1986 on Münsterstraße in Lüdinghausen.

Then, 21 years ago, she opened Café Indigo together with her husband Rolf. "The perfect combination. We were able to offer the many visitors - often whole buses come to us - a nice place to have a coffee," says Schlüter. Nadine Wenge

World cultural heritage: Blueprinting is a centuries-old fabric finishing technique that is still practised by only twelve companies in Germany and 15 across Europe. UNESCO has now underlined the great importance of blueprinting by inscribing it on the List of Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity.

Together with the indigo dye plant, the technique was introduced to Europe by travelers from the Dutch East India Company in the 17th century.