Design Map · Eindhoven
Oya
Graduation project by Aleyra Can at Design Academy Eindhoven, 2026. Shown during Dutch Design Week in Eindhoven on Design Map, location F5.
Made slowly, made by hand, made to be passed on. Aleyra Can explores how the knowledge of oya, a Turkish needlework craft, can be kept alive. Once a kind of language passed on between women, oya motifs carry meanings that are increasingly forgotten. A daisy can express purity and sincerity, while a mountain represents endurance and a connection to the land.
Aleyra Can travelled to Turkey to meet craftswomen who continue to practise and pass on oya. She developed a collection of kits, each containing materials, tools and guidance, alongside a dictionary of motifs. Displayed alongside the kits is a beginner’s violet-motif clot, hand-stitched by the designer over three weeks, showing the finished result.
A companion website shares the history of the craft, hosts tutorials and connects people through workshops. Rather than preserving oya as something to look at, the project keep its knowledge in motion as it’s made by one pair of hands and passed on to the next.