At Los Tres Yoga we have a deep love and appreciation for every item we make. Each item is a one of a kind creation made up of textiles that contain many stories, cultural traditions, a myriad of color and history! Because they are made from repurposed traditional wear they each have their own unique character and may have color variations or slight wear. They are made to reflect their previous life as traditional clothing to share the incredible beauty of the Mayan culture, and to reflect our passion and love for yoga and life.
Los Tres Yoga began in Lake Atitlan Guatemala when Carolina and Michelle met and began hosting yoga retreats at La KzonA Atitlan.
They connected with a local seamster (Juan) and began repurposing the vibrant Mayan textiles from the lake Atitlan basin--Cortes, huipiles and fajas became yoga mat bags, zafu’s and zabatons(meditation cushions), eye pillows, yoga stretching straps and mat holsters.
All the cloth we use is repurposed.
Cortes are the skirts used by the Mayan women of the highlands of Guatemala. A full Corte is 6 varas (similar to a yard) and wrapped around, tucked and held in place by a faja (belt). A Huipil is the beautiful embroidered shirt. All these clothing articles are handmade from start to finish (a few huipiles and fajas are machine embroidered). It takes months for these articles to be completed and sell new for the equivalent of hundreds of u.s. dollars. Cortes are made mostly by men on a foot loom, the huipiles and fajas are made mostly by women on a hip loom and then hand embroidered. Intricate patterns are created with thousands of threads of different colors, manipulated back and forth, over and under. This technique creates figures, patterns, actions by memory, by heart. No written instructions, passed down verbally through the generations of weavers.
Our meditation cushions include a liner so that you can wash the cover if you ever need to (hand wash in cold water), liners are repurposed from the ‘paca’ (containers of discarded articles from the US that find their way to Guatemala for reuse).
These practices keep our impact on the environment low, provide fair trade/fair wages to the female artisans we work with (and quite possibly originally wore them)-which helps benefit the local surrounding Lake Atitlan community and economy.
Our current seamstress/artisan is Rosalia, local to Santiago Atitlán. She is in the process of completing her degree in Clinical Psychology and fulfilling her dreams of supporting at risk children, youth and women. Your purchase of a Los Tres item helps support her schooling costs and living standards. With the work from Los Tres Yoga and other projects, in a few years she has grown from a second hand gifted sewing machine to having now her own shop with industrial sewing machines and a crew of 3! She is quite the artist!
Michelle, born and raised in Las Vegas, Nevada, came to Guatemala to support a community language project and fell in love with Lake Atitlan, it’s people and their textiles.
Carolina was born and raised in Guatemala and lived much of her adult life in the US, returning to her birth country in 2011 for the new Baktun cycle.
The latest to join the team is Carolynn also in Las Vegas, bringing her insight, vision and business skills to the mix.
Our brand Los Tres means "The Three" in spanish signifying- three people, three volcanoes (surrounding Santiago Atitlán - Atitlan, Toliman and San Pedro, reflected on our label) and the three elements of Yoga (Mind, Body & Spirit).
Instagram: @lostresyoga