Carpet Production and Sales
Photos by Daniel Kennedy.
Future Carpets-Drying Wool
Afghan goats grazing outside a village in northern Afghanistan in the Hindu Kush (the original Silk Route) mountain range. The traditional carpets are made from their wool.
Skeins of freshly dyed wool drying in the sun.
Skeins of freshly dyed wool drying in the sun.
Vegetal Dye Process
Pile of cut shrub branches. These will be boiled with wool to dye the wool a "wooden color."
Bowl of natural plant ingredients for dyeing.
Close up of sources of vegetal colors derived from plant flowers, stems, buds and also fruits and fruit rinds.
Afghan woman, holding a balance scale, demonstrates how to measure vegetal dyes for the dyeing pot.
Afghan woman "cooking" vegetal dyes and dyeing wool in preparation for weaving.
Afghan woman "cooking" vegetal dyes and dyeing wool in preparation for weaving.
Strands of wool after color dyeing.
Spinning the Wool
Afghan women spinning wool into thread so it can be woven to make a carpet.
Afghan woman spinning wool into thread the traditional way.
Afghan women spinning wool into thread so it can be woven to make a carpet.
Carpet Tools and Finishing
Afghan man selling tools used in the carpet weaving process.
The trimming process, after a carpet has been woven.
The washing process. Preparing a carpet for the marketplace.
Freshly dyed wool dries in the sun. Behind it, a carpet is being washed and prepared for market.
Carpet Markets
A typical (very neat) Afghan, retail carpet store.
The carpet market in Andkhoy in northern Afghanistan.
Carpets ready for the market.
Contemporary Afghan businesswoman and her child in a retail carpet market in Kabul.
Carpet dealer and Afghan businesswoman Mrs. Fawzia Hashimi showing newly made, classic Afghan carpets in her retail store “The Community of Afghan Women Handicrafts" in Kabul.