Photo Portfolio: BEHİÇ GÜNALAN

Heather goes through many processes before becoming a broom thread.

Edirne is one of the rare cities where the heather plant can grow.

Heather plants, which are dried out in sulfur rooms, are picked, wrapped, sewn and packaged.

The numbers of broom makers are decreasing day by day.

Edirne’s last broom makers are struggling to keep this tradition, which has been passed over generations, alive.

Hanging a mirrored thread broom outside the house is a sign for a single girl in the house who is looking for a husband.

The brooms lost their popularity as a cleaning tool, nowadays they are an object for decoration.

These craftsmen used to get together in “Broom Makers Bazaar”; however, nowadays they have been scattered to wrecked parts of the city.

Craftsmen say nobody wants to become a broom maker anymore and agree on the fact that time has swept up broom makers as well.