Rasuljon Mirzaahmedov

Uzbekistan

Hand Woven Ikat

The region of the Ferghana Valley (Margilan) is famous for its handmade silk ikat production.  Rasuljon represents five generations of ikat weavers in Margilan City, the most famous place for silk production in Central Asia. His family is at the vanguard in a revival of velvet ikat weaving in which white silk threads are dyed and placed on a narrow loom, a technique that is highly complicated and practiced by very few. The process requires a month to produce just a few yards of fabric.
Rasuljon has created ikat cloth for international designers to use in their yearly collections and in 2005 his work was awarded a Seal of Excellence by UNESCO. In 2007 UNESCO helped Rasuljon establish a training center in Margilan City and currently he is writing a book on “Secrets of Natural Dyes”.