Threads of the Mughals: Pakistan’s Golden Age of Craft

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When the Mughal Empire arrived in the 16th century, it did not merely conquer territory. It transformed the visual and material culture of the subcontinent — and nowhere was this transformation more profound or more lasting than in the world of textiles.

AN EMPIRE THAT WORE ITS POWER

The Mughal emperors understood, with great political acuity, that the clothes you wore said something about who you were and who you intended to be. Fabric was not merely a practical matter under Mughal rule; it was a statement of power, sophistication, and cultural ambition. The court in Lahore — one of the empire’s most important cities — became a centre of textile production and patronage that attracted master craftspeople from Persia, Central Asia, and across the subcontinent.

The textiles produced under Mughal patronage were unlike anything that had come before: gold and silver brocades worked with extraordinary intricacy, fine-figured muslins so sheer they were described by European visitors as ‘woven air,’ printed and painted fabrics of blazing colour, exquisite hand-knotted carpets, and embroideries of almost impossible delicacy. These were not cottage industry products; they were the output of organised imperial workshops employing thousands of skilled artisans.

AKBAR AND JAHANGIR: EMPERORS AS PATRONS

Emperor Akbar, who ruled from 1556 to 1605, was among the most active patrons of craft in Mughal history. He established karkhanas — imperial workshops — in Lahore and other major cities, bringing together weavers, embroiderers, dyers, and designers under state organisation and support. It was Akbar who introduced carpet weaving to the region on a significant scale, drawing on Persian and Central Asian techniques and establishing Lahore as the centre of this art — a distinction the city retains to this day.

His son Jahangir continued this legacy, taking personal interest in the refinement of crafts and introducing new fashions — among them the khussa, the embroidered leather slipper that became one of the iconic objects of Mughal material culture and that remains a beloved craft tradition in Punjab to this day.

THE WOMEN WHO SHAPED MUGHAL TEXTILES

It would be a significant omission to discuss Mughal textile patronage without acknowledging the role of its women. Nur Jehan — the extraordinarily influential wife of Emperor Jahangir — was not merely a passive recipient of fine cloth. She was an active innovator, introducing Persian-inspired designs in formal textiles and jewellery that persist in Pakistani craft traditions to this day. Mumtaz Mahal, for whom the Taj Mahal was built, was similarly influential as a patron of the arts.

The Mughal court also institutionalised the Meena Bazaar — an exclusive market held for women of the royal household — where textiles, perfumery, and jewellery were displayed and sold. This was not simply shopping; it was a mechanism of patronage, through which royal women extended their influence over the production and refinement of craft.

LAHORE AND THE ZARDOZI TRADITION

Among the most enduring of the Mughal textile legacies in Pakistan is zardozi — the art of embroidering cloth with gold and silver threads. Lahore, the Mughal empire’s Punjab capital, became and remained the foremost centre of this art. Zardozi work was used to adorn royal garments, ceremonial objects, and the interiors of palaces and mosques. The precision required — each thread placed by hand, the designs often drawn from the same geometric and floral vocabulary that adorned Mughal architecture — made it one of the most prestigious of all craft forms.

Today, zardozi remains a living tradition in Lahore’s craft workshops, practiced by artisans whose families have worked in this form for generations. When a Pakistani bride wears an embroidered wedding outfit, she is, often without knowing it, wearing the aesthetic legacy of the Mughal court.

AN INHERITANCE THAT NEVER LEFT

The Mughal Empire declined through the 18th century and formally ended with British colonisation in 1858. But the textile traditions it nurtured did not disappear. They adapted, survived, and in many cases flourished — passed down through artisan families, sustained by local demand, and carried forward into the present day. The block-printing workshops of Lahore, the carpet weavers of Peshawar, the embroiderers of Multan — all trace a lineage that runs directly back to the imperial karkhanas of the Mughal era.