The Rug Library

Jawaja dhurries come from the Jawaja–Beawar area of Rajasthan, where weavers of the Bhambi/Bunkar community weave cotton, wool and jute on pit looms that use no electricity.

After 1959, Tibetan refugees who settled in Nepal and parts of northern India turned to carpet weaving as a livelihood, helping bring Tibetan-style rugs to Western markets.

Women of the Bhutia community in Sikkim weave hand-knotted woollen carpets with largely Tibetan designs on upright wooden frame looms, along with small square seat rugs called asans.

Monpa women in Tawang, Arunachal Pradesh, weave woollen carpets featuring dragons, snow lions, birds and flowers, with designs influenced by Tibetan Buddhist art.

Kharad, a Sindhi word for carpet, is a Kutch weaving tradition of rugs made from camel, goat and sheep hair on a simple horizontal loom with two pegged rods.

Kharad is a shared craft: herding communities such as the Jats and Rabaris supply animal fibre, it is spun locally, and weavers of the Vankar community weave the rugs.

The Bhotia Dann is a handwoven rug made by Bhotia communities of Uttarakhand, including the Johari Shaukas of Munsiyari, using Tibetan-style knotting and motifs such as geometric forms, lotus and wheel.

Bhotiya weavers of Uttarakhand make the thulma, a very thick, heavy blanket of sheep's wool, alongside danns (rugs) and small asanas.

Bhotiya wool dyeing traditionally relied on natural sources such as indigo and madder, a practice documented by researchers studying the community's indigenous knowledge.

Monpa carpets are given as gifts at weddings and festivals and are also used in monasteries in the Tawang region.

Bhotia dann weaving is said to have begun roughly a century ago, when Johari women from Pithoragarh went to Tarikhet in Almora district to learn frame-loom carpet weaving.

In the Niti-Mana, Darma, Byans and Chaudans valleys of Uttarakhand, Bhotiya weavers use Tibetan-style knotting to make danns and small asana rugs.

The Vankar weavers of Bhujodi in Kutch trace their ancestry to the Meghwal community, who are said to have migrated from Rajasthan several centuries ago.