BHUTAN’S TEXTILE TRADITIONS CONTINUE TO EVOLVE, from the resurgence of interest in natural dyeing among lifelong weavers, to the young people reinventing the national dress. From ancient techniques to modern styles, Bhutan’s fabrics tell TALES OF HISTORY AND ARTISTRY that are more relevant than ever.
In an airy café in central Thimphu, teenage girls and women in their 20s are sipping iced coffees, sharing slices of cheesecake and discussing work over omelettes and quinoa bowls. Some are dressed in crop tops, baggy jeans and trainers. Others wear traditional kira – long columnar skirts cinched at the waist with embroidered kera, or belts. Accessorised with tego jackets featuring contrasting, turned-up cuffs, worn over crisp shirts or paired with court shoes, they're an arrestingly modern manifestation of Bhutan's long-standing textile tradition.
It's a living heritage you'll encounter in every restaurant and office, home and hotel, and on streets from Haa to Trashigang to Sarpang. The national dress – kira for women and draped robes called gho for men – is part of daily life. Schoolchildren in smart mini versions chatter on their way to class and professionals wear it to meetings.
One young woman, Kezang Choden, cuts a striking figure on Thimphu's main avenue in her colour-blocked, golden-ochre kira. Her matching tego, with its geometric motifs, would be just as at home on the streets of Brooklyn or Aoyama. Her mum made it, she says, like all of her kira. But Kezang designed this one herself. "I chose the colours and the pattern. I was inspired by street style," she explains. "My mum found the design a little funny at first because [to her] it's so plain, but when she finished weaving it, and I put it on with the tego and sent her a picture of me wearing it, she was like, 'Oh, this actually looks nice!'"
Textiles old and new are everywhere here. They appear as decorative wall-hangings, bed covers and throw cushions in exclusive hotels and simple B&Bs alike. Not so long ago, these beautifully woven bolts of cloth were even used as towels. They're worn and exchanged for weddings, festivals and celebrations. In temples and monasteries across the kingdom, they adorn altars or form ceremonial robes.
No-one really knows when textiles, and weaving, arrived in Bhutan – but, like many things here, stories and songs offer an explanation. According to local lore, a Chinese royal, Princess Wencheng, introduced weaving to Bhutan during the seventh century. Travelling through the country on her way to marry Tibetan king Songtsen Gampo in Lhasa, the princess – known to the Bhutanese as Ashi Jyazum – was greeted en route by local people burning incense in welcome. Ashi Jyazum, say the stories, was so moved by this gesture that she gifted the people of Kurtoe a backstrap loom and the knowledge to use it.
However much truth there may be in this tale, Bhutanese textile production began in central and eastern areas well over a thousand years ago, before spreading throughout the kingdom. Regions developed their own distinctive techniques and traditions, from Lhuentse’s highly intricate silk-on-silk kushuthara to the tactility of Radhi's bura. Materials hint at the regions' different climates and ways of life: yak and sheep wool in the mountainous north; nettle, cotton, hemp and silk in the east and south. But skill, tradition and quality are common to every region's fabrics – as is the pride in wearing them.