The fastest way to tie shoe laces...

Professor Shoelace shows the fastest way to tie shoes. It looks really simple but it does take some practice. Professor Shoelace

Buttons are thought to have originated about 4,000 years ago, but at first they were used only as decoration. Pins and belts were used for fastening garments. The use of a button with a buttonhole did not come into use until the 13th century. 

Women and girls of bygone years collected and traded buttons, but in the rules of the day, the buttons could not be purchased. They had to be gifted or traded. The story is told of young girls gathering buttons for "charm strings" because it was said that once she had collected 999 buttons her future husband would provide her with the 1,000th. 

Here is one of a number of brief histories and development of the button. And in case you prefer a short video, here is a presentation by Isaac Mizrahi on Ted.

Batik has been around for centuries and is still made in very much the same way as it was long ago... hand printed and hand dyed. Some of the patterns can be intricately complicated. Here are some of the better links. Batik, the Traditional Fabric of Indonesia is an Indonesian web site that includes a brief history of batik. It also includes an explanation of the tools and process used. The step by step batik process is an interesting view.

This short video with subtitles shows the fabric process. Another one, also short and with narration, is a visit to a batik factory.

Silk has been around for a long time. Invented in China thousands of years ago, it was a carefully guarded secret for many years. There are a number of legends regarding its beginning as well as how the secret of silk production was smuggled out of China. 

For your reference, a brief history of silk is from the Silk Association of Great Britain website. Another site shows a silk history for kids. 

Try milking one million spiders for their silken threads. Spiders, not silk worms. It's a very different process and no, they did not kill the spiders. Read the story from Wired Magazine here. Look here for the cape, and more cape photos here.