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Textiles of the Middle East and Central Asia: The Fabric of Life, Fahmida Suleman
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Textiles of the Middle East and Central Asia serves as a captivating visual and scholarly voyage across centuries of exquisite weaving, embroidery, and patterned cloth. Co‑published by the British Museum and Thames & Hudson, this atlas‑like volume guides the reader from Persian velvets and Ottoman kaftans to Central Asian ikats and suzanis, each richly captioned and contextualised. The tactile images, archival drawings, and lively contextual essays convey not only the dazzling artistry but the vibrant cultural and commercial crossroads in which these textiles thrived—whether buffer zones of empires, sacred precincts, caravan trade routes or domestic looms.
The layout evokes a curatorial stroll through the Museum’s galleries: sumptuous double spreads of silk and brocade are paired with illuminating close‑ups of weave structure and stitch detail. The essays interweave technical insight—familiarity with warp, weft, resist‑dyeing, shibori and ikat—with poetic reflections on cloth as history, identity and exchange. Whether inspired by nomadic yurt linings, sumptuous Yemeni curtain cloths or Uzbek chapan jackets, this is a book to be savoured, its pages resonant with the colours, motifs and techniques that have travelled and evolved across centuries and borders.
'A fascinating visual resource, full of beautiful, detailed images and lots of surprises … exciting … the text is concise and informative … It is a pleasure to learn by looking through this delightful book' - Jennifer Wearden, former curator of Islamic Textiles at the Victoria & Albert Museum
'A visual feast and an eye-opening history' - History Revealed
'Lives up to its title in examining “the fabric of life” across time in this vast region' - Embroidery
'Richly illustrated … there is a lot to be learned about the region in this beautifully presented book' - Journal for Weavers, Spinners & Dyers
'Beautifully illustrated ... this publication provides an exquisite guide through the collection' - Anthropos Journal
About the Author
Dr Fahmida Suleman is the Phyllis Bishop Curator for the Modern Middle East at the British Museum, where she masterminded the thematic structure of Textiles of the Middle East and Central Asia, exploring cloth across life's stages—from wedding and childhood garments to ritual and political textiles . A scholar-curator fluent in both material nuance and cultural story, she draws on deep knowledge of textile traditions to foreground how cloth embodies belief, identity and exchange across centuries.
Publication date: 2017
Publisher: Thames & Hudson
Pages: 269
ISBN: 9780500519912
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