Fibre Terroir · Reference Series · Dune Collection

Kharad is a flatweave from Kachchh, in western Gujarat, woven on a loom of two rods pegged into the ground. It was made from the hair of the animals that pastoral communities kept: camel, goat and sheep [1][2].

That is the history. This piece is about the present: what a Kharad weaver actually buys, spins, dyes and weaves in 2026, what it costs, and how to live with the result. A small collection of new work sits at the end.

At a glance

What the word means

Kharad is the Sindhi word for carpet, and in Kachchh it names both the rugs and the way they are woven [2][3]. The same weavers historically made two related pieces: the khurjani, placed across a camel's back to carry loads, and the rasa, a heavy cloth used to cover stored grain [1]. Kharads themselves were spread on the ground for warmth and for gatherings [2].

Above: From TAIC Archives, a floor pillow made from a khurjani

The economics of a hand-spun rug

Most writing about heritage craft skips the arithmetic. It is the most interesting part, because it explains what a Kharad is and why it costs what it costs.

Weaver Damabhai works through the numbers on hand-spun local wool*:

• Spinning 250 grams of local Kutch wool by hand takes a full day.
• At a fair daily wage of ₹400–₹500, that puts undyed, hand-spun yarn at over ₹2,000 per kilogram (1CAD = ₹69, conversion at the publication-date rate) before a single weft has been passed.
• For a 4x6ft kharad rug, handpsun wool alone would cost ₹10,000 (approx. CAD145, based on conversion at the publication-date rate)

That figure is the whole story of the craft's supply chain in one line.

It also explains a shift that published documentation records from the other direction: hand-spinning of camel and goat hair has ended in Kachchh, and weavers now buy their wool from Rajasthan [1][2]. 

The occasion on which hand-spun wool might be available is when the weaver is paid sufficiently to either commission it from small-scale spinners (see image below), as it was for our Pastoralist Throws, or bought from Khamir - a local not-for-profit organization dedicated to preserving indigenous crafts and fibres and driving regional craft-based economy - that regularly commissions handspun wool.

Above: A Rabari woman spinning wool on commission, 2025

Damabhai describes the same shift from the loom's side. Local hand-spun wool can be coarse against the skin as well as expensive, so mill-spun white Merino wool is bought in from mills at Bikaner, in Rajasthan. The structure of the weave holds either way, but the price does not.

Borrowed vocabulary: bean-to-bar. In chocolate, grower, fermenter and maker are often separate hands, and losing any one step changes what reaches the bar. Kharad had three hands: herder, spinner, weaver. The weaving continues. The spinning step is the one that has gone from routine process. That is why we ask two questions of every piece: which animal, and who spun it.

What terroir means when the supply chain changes

We could have written this article as though every Kharad still begins with a Kutch camel and a hand spindle. It would be a better story and a false one.

Terroir was never only about where a raw material grew. In wine it takes in the soil, the slope, the weather of that particular year, and the choices of the person making it, which including the choices forced by a bad harvest. A vineyard that loses a crop to frost and buys in fruit says so on the label. The place is still in the bottle; the year is part of the record.

Kharad's fibre chain has changed, and that change is the terroir of Kachchh right now. Hand-spinning of camel and goat hair has ended in the district, and weavers buy wool from Rajasthan [1][2].

A day of hand-spinning yields only 250 grams. Mill-spun yarn from Bikaner costs a fraction of that and a softer option is available. Those are the conditions the craft is practised in today, and a weaver who adapts to them is doing what weavers have always done.

So when we describe a Kharad piece, we name what is actually in it:

• the fibre and where it was spun, mill or hand, Kutch or Rajasthan;
• the dyes, listed individually;
• the loom and the artist.

The technique is what makes a Kharad a Kharad: the pegged ground loom, the pattern read backwards in a mirror, the weft beaten down with a hatho. That knowledge sits in Kachchh, in a small number of families, and it is not portable in the way a bale of wool is.

Above: A hatho, used to weave a kharad, resting on the Char Wool Rug

The dyes

Damabhai has learned to dye by hand. He extracts some colours on his own and relies on synthetic compound for what he cannot.

• Indigo for blues, greens, reds and pinks.
• Alizarin compound for pinks and reds.
• Babool bark, from local acacia, for shades of browns.
• Fermented iron black derived from iron scrap, pearl millet (bajra) flour and jaggery, fermented for 15 to 20 days, then combined with harda (myrobalan) for a deep, permanent black.

Documentation of the craft records a similar palette in use historically: indigo for blue, pomegranate rind for yellow, babool bark for brown, lac for red. Traditional Kharads were largely black, brown, white or ochre. In most cases, this was the colours of the fleece itself [2]. This traditional Kharad is what is available through the capsule collection of rugs in the  Dune Collection.

Above: Dayabhai weaving the Char Wool Rug

A note on our vocabulary. We use two terms precisely, and only where they are accurate for the specific piece:

• Undyed: fleece left in its original colour.
• Naturally dyed: dyed with the methods named above, listed individually rather than under a blanket claim.

Borrowed vocabulary: vintage. Undyed fleece varies from animal to animal. Dye lots vary from batch to batch. Two Kharad pieces in the same colourway will not match exactly, and the difference is a record of the batch.

The loom and the weave

The loom is about as simple as looms get: two rods pegged into the ground on opposite sides, the distance between them setting the length of the piece [2].

As documented from interviews with weavers [2]:

• Warping. A taut warp is stretched between the rods, from 140 to 200 threads, depending on the size of the piece.
• Weaving. The weaver lifts alternate warp threads by hand to open a shed, passes the wool weft through, and beats it down with a wooden tool called a hatho.
• Reading the pattern. The design is built from the back. A mirror under the loom lets the weaver check the face as it forms.
• Finishing. The piece comes off the loom and the loose ends are knotted.

Kharad is a flatweave: there are no cut tufts standing up from the surface [2]. It is sometimes called a Kharad dhurrie [2]. What sets it apart is the combination of animal fibre, the ground loom, and a pattern worked in reverse.

Borrowed vocabulary: processing. Beans from one coffee farm taste different depending on whether it is washed. The method is part of the origin. Wool from Kachchh can become a shawl that drapes, or a Kharad that lies flat and holds its shape. The loom is as much a part of the terroir as the animal.

What the technique can do now

Traditional Kharad is geometric, and the yarn is the reason: coarse wool does not hold fine detail, so the designs are bold [1]. Contemporary work by master weavers pushes in two directions:

• Relief and sculptural weaving. Varying yarn thickness within one piece — fine mill-spun wool worked against heavier local fibre — raises motifs off the surface into low relief.
• Pictorial work. Landscapes, botanical fields and abstract colour blocks woven as textile canvases rather than floor coverings.

Living with Kharad

A small piece and a large one show the same weave at different distances. The coaster is the tasting portion; you read the structure up close. The rug is the whole bottle.

Small pieces · coasters, trivets, swatches (4 × 4 in to 2 × 2 ft)

• Shadow-box framing. Mount a small piece in a deep frame with an off-white mat and space between glass and textile, so relief and surface read properly. Frame a sample of the weave in the same room as the rug it belongs to.
• On the table. Coasters in a shallow wooden tray rather than in a drawer. Trivets under stoneware serving dishes and teapots. Keep pans taken straight off a burner or out of a hot oven on metal, not on wool.
• Off the table. Under a small planter with a saucer, a vase, or a tray of keys by the door.
• Blot condensation and spills rather than letting moisture sit, especially on naturally dyed pieces.
• Mix colourways within a set of four. Batch variation reads as intentional when every piece differs slightly.

Medium pieces · tapestries and wall hangings (1 × 5 ft to 3 × 5 ft)

• Stretched mounting. Wrapped over a concealed wooden frame, a Kharad hangs as a textile painting with no visible hardware.
• Rod suspension. A brass or dark timber rod through a top sleeve leaves the raw edges and knotted ends visible.
• Conservation mounting. For anything heavier, the Canadian Conservation Institute recommends a hook-and-loop strip sewn to a fabric sleeve, which spreads weight evenly across the top edge. It advises against nails, tacks and staples, which distort the textile and can stain it [4].
• Placement. A long vertical piece suits the narrow wall between two windows or a stair landing. Horizontally, above a headboard, a console or a hall bench. At 1 ft wide, a tapestry also runs down the centre of a long table — with a trivet under anything hot.

Large pieces · rugs and statement works (4 × 6 ft and above)

• On the wall. A large geometric or pictorial Kharad on a plain wall in a living room or stairwell. Use the conservation mounting method above; weight matters at this size.
• On the floor. Studies, bedrooms, the foot of a bed, and other lower-traffic rooms, where the density is felt underfoot rather than ground down.
• Furniture. In a seating group, the front legs of every piece on the rug ties the arrangement together.
• What not to put on it. Rolling desk chairs wear a flatweave quickly. In a Canadian entryway, keep the rug past the boot tray — road salt and meltwater are hard on wool.
• Bold geometry holds a room on its own. Keep surrounding textiles plain or tonal.

Runners and made-to-order lengths

Runners and stair runners are woven to order rather than cut from a larger piece. For stairs, measure the width, then the depth of one tread plus the height of one riser, multiplied by the number of steps, plus the landing. A flatweave sits close to the stair nose, which suits stairs better than a thick pile. Have it fitted by a professional installer with an underlay rated for stairs. Please contact us to get an estimate.

Light

Light fades colour and weakens textile fibre over time, and ultraviolet in daylight is a major cause [5]. Rotate floor pieces every few months, and keep wall pieces out of long hours of direct sun.

Care

• Routine: vacuum on suction only, without a beater bar. Shake small pieces out.
• Spills: blot immediately with a clean cloth and cold water. Do not rub.
• Naturally dyed pieces: test any cleaning method on a hidden area first. The Canadian Conservation Institute publishes guidance on testing colourfastness [6].
• Deep cleaning: a professional cleaner experienced with handwoven wool.
• Storage: roll rather than fold. CCI publishes notes on flat and rolled storage for textiles [6].

The collection

A small group of Kharad pieces woven by Damabhai arrives this month. 130 pieces in total: coasters, trivets, and a couple of tapestries.

These are not listed online. They are available in person only, at Guelph Farmers Market (2 Gordon St, Guelph) on Saturdays from 8am-1pm till the stock lasts. Come and handle them. A weave this dense is understood better through the fingers than on a screen, and the pieces do not photograph their weight.

References & Further Reading

Accessed in September 2026.

1. Khamir. "Kharad Weaving." Craft documentation page, undated. https://khamir.org/crafts/kharad-weaving
2. Gaatha. "Kharad weaving, Kutch." Craft documentation based on interviews with weavers; published January 2024, updated July 2026. https://gaatha.org/Craft-of-India/kharad-weaving-kutch/
3. Threads Unpicked. "Kharad Weaving of Kachchh." First-hand account of a workshop visit, 2017. http://threads-unpicked.com/kharad-weaving-of-kachchh/
4. Canadian Conservation Institute. "Velcro Support System for Textiles." CCI Notes 13/4. https://www.canada.ca/en/conservation-institute/services/conservation-preservation-publications/canadian-conservation-institute-notes/velcro-support-system-textiles.html
5. Canadian Conservation Institute. "Textiles and the Environment." CCI Notes 13/1. https://www.canada.ca/en/conservation-institute/services/conservation-preservation-publications/canadian-conservation-institute-notes/textiles-environment.html
6. Canadian Conservation Institute. "Textiles and costumes" (index of CCI Notes, Series 13). https://www.canada.ca/en/conservation-institute/services/care-objects/textiles-costumes.html

*Cost, sourcing and dye figures are the weaver's own account, given in the video above.