The Two-Tone Lily Norigae.

The story

Norigae is the ornament tied at the goreum, the ribbon that closes the jeogori. The form has lived inside the household wardrobe for centuries. The lily motif is one of the older botanical references in the Korean ornament register, read for grace, for restraint, for the household that keeps a garden. A two-tone reading lets the same flower carry two colors at once.

Silk cord in two tonal colors, hand-knotted into the lily form in our Seoul workshop. The knot draws the petals at the central element, the tassel hangs beneath in the secondary tone. The piece is sized for special-occasion hanbok, lighter than the ceremonial knot norigae but more deliberate than the daily forms.

Worn to a spring portrait where a mother and a daughter wear hanbok in close colors and the norigae carries both tones at the bride's chest. A mother-of-the-bride dinner where the wardrobe answers the wedding palette in one small ornament. The piece that does the color coordination without insisting on it.