Kashmir Rug

Kashmir Rug
General information
Name	Kashmir Rug
Original name	فرش کشمیر، قالی کشمیر
Alternative name(s)	Kashmir Carpet
Origin	India
Technical information

Kashmir Rug or Kashmir Carpet is one of the eastern rugs that woven in India.
The northernmost state of India, primarily Muslim in population. Kashmir was noted for the intricately patterned hand embroidered shawls produced there in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. These shawls used elabo rate boteh motifs. In the early nineteenth century, these designs were copied on power looms in Paisley, Scotland and these machine-woven shawls displaced the Kashmir embroidered shawls in the market.
Kashmir pile rugs achieved prominence in the midnineteenth century. Contemporary Kashmir rugs are woven primarily on a cotton foundation, the better ones having a knot density of about 400 to 480 knots per square inch. Rugs are double-wefted with offset warps.
Most rugs are jufti knotted with outlines in regular knots. Some silk pile rugs are woven. Most designs are copies of early Persian carpets. Some are pictorial rugs with images of Hindu deities.

History

Kashmir is a region in the northern portion of India. Carpets are known in the market from the Mughal ruling period (1526-1858). Early Kashmir weavings are named Mughal Carpets in the trade.
The Kashmir region was originally famous for weaving shawls made from pashmina wool and the processing of high-grade quality wool. The region was a trade center for Britain's East India Company (1757-1857) during its presence in India. By the mid-nineteenth century shawl production decreased drastically because of the advances in machine-made shawl manufacturing in Europe. Many shawl weavers immigrated to other northern Indian cities to weave textiles and carpets. Some of the remaining weavers began to weave rugs with Persian and Bukhara designs. During the British Raj period (r. 1858-1947), foreign companies set up looms in Kashmir to produce Persian design pieces of low to medium grade quality for foreign export.
In 1947 India and Pakistan were each granted independence, but the region of Kashmir became a disputed territory among three countries: India, Pakistan, and China. Indian Kashmir weavers continued weaving Persian carpet designs for domestic and worldwide markets, whereas in the Pakistan Kashmir territory weavers made Bukhara carpet designs, which were fashionable in Western markets. By the last quarter of the twentieth century Pakistan Kashmir weavers switched to Persian designs of high quality and successfully continue producing this style to the present day.

Bibliography

• Abraham Levi Moheban. 2015. The Encyclopedia of Antique Carpets: Twenty-Five Centuries of Weaving. NewYork: Princeton Architectural Press.
• Peter F. Stone. 2013. Oriental Rugs: An Illustrated Lexicon of Motifs, Materials, and Origins. North Clarendon: Tuttle