Unlined summer robe (hitoe) with cormorant-fishing design early 19th century Japan During the Edo period, summer robes made from crepe or open-weave bast fabrics were worn by fashionable women beginning in May, when the weather made heavier silk garments impractical. This light-weight summer robe of pale blue was made from the finest quality silk and decorated with paste-resist dyeing, stencil-dyed dots, silk and couched gold thread embroidery, and hand-painted wild ginger (aoi) crests on the shoulders and back. The design of cormorants swimming among reeds, drying fishing nets, and flowers, with a fishermans straw coat and hat on one boat and a fishing basket on another, is a reference to the Noh play Ukai (Cormorant Fishing). As an image whose literary origins could be recognized by a well-educated woman of the upper classes, it belongs to the goshodoki (court style) category of design, which typically combined seasonal elements with motifs drawn from literary themes. The play to wh