We are a team of motivated individuals who have lived and worked in Cambodia and Asia over the last 14 years . We have experiences in local crafts, fashion, marketing & telecommunications.
We work alongside the local craftsmen & women to advise and teach skills such as design, production and quality control.

S4silk is a wholesale outlet for hand made silks from Cambodia. At present we are only showcasing raw silk from 3 provinces in Cambodia. Our netx trip to the land of silk, will be in August 2003. From mid September 2003 we will also be able to bring you organza and a wide range of supreme silks.

Launched in June 2003, S4silk welcomes any comments that would make the site easier for our clients to use. Please feel free to send comments to info@s4silk.com

History of silk

Discovery of Silk

A conflicting legend attributes the discovery of Silk to HsiLing Shih , the consort of Emperor Huang Ti , China first imperial ruler ( 2640 B.C. ). The story goes that as Hsi Ling Shih sat languidly sipping her tea beneath the mulberry trees in the Imperial Gardens, a creamy colored cocoon landed in her cup. To her astonishment, it unraveled to form a long a delicate tread. Delighted with its beauty, she gathered thread from thousands of other cocoons and wove them into a ceremonial robe for the Emperor.

Evidence indicates that sericulture and silk weaving techniques originated in China four to five thousands years ago. In Shangtung province, the Imperial Court established factories to weave silk fabric both for ceremonial use and as gifts for foreign powers. Chinese emperors profited handsomely taxes levied on silk and the fabric became so treasured that it was used as measure of currency and reward.

The art spread

For hundreds of years, the Chinese jealously guarded the secret art of sericulture. As a result, sericulture spread slowly. It reached Khotan on the Afghanistan border around 140 BC, when an Imperial princess married a prince of Khotan and smuggled out silkworm eggs by hiding them in her headdress. According to legend, the art spread east to Japan around AD 195, but under less romantic conditions. Two Chinese concubines were kidnapped and coerced into revealing the secret, which was then exchanged for a large reward. Western legend claims that in AD 550, the Roman Emperor Justinian persuaded two monks to journey to China to search for the secret. Two years later they returned; one monk carried white mulberry seeds in a pouch, and the other concealed the silkworm eggs in his bamboo cane.

The Greeks began producing silk after Alexander the Great (356-323 BC) conquered Persia and in 330B.C. China was referred to as the "Land of Silk" by the Egyptians.

Nevertheless silk was held to be a sacred commodity in the West until the Han Dynasty (205 BC to AD 220), when the perilous Silk Road came into existence. It began in Xi'an in Shaanxi Province and ran across the central Asian continent, through Persia to the Mediterranean Sea. From there, the silk reached the other destinations by ship. Few completed the whole journey caravan loads were passed from trader to trader and often exchanged for commodities such as gold, jade, wool, horses and glass.
Around 1275, the Venetian explorer Marco Polo returned to Italy after years of adventure in China and Asia, bringing with him glorious silks and sericulture knowledge. From the 14th century, silk production thrived in Europe, and both Italy and France became important silk centers. By the 17th century, sericulture reached the American Colonies with the early settlers and thereby had encircled the globe.