How it began
Kushuthara is a silk textile native to northeastern Bhutan, made and worn by women. The Impart Encyclopedia of Art describes it as indigenous to the Lhuntse district, specifically the villages of Kurtoe and Khoma, and says it is thought to date back to at least the seventeenth century. According to The Textile Atlas, between the 17th and 19th centuries, as the wrapped kira dress became popular, weavers in Kurtoe began embellishing the striped thara kira with supplementary weft patterns. Little is known about its earliest development.
Before it existed
Before kushuthara took its current form, people in north-central and eastern Bhutan wore tunics with supplementary weft patterns known as kushung, made of cotton and nettle instead of silk. A kushung was two panels sewn together lengthwise and folded at the shoulders, with a hole for the head. These tunics included human and animal figures as motifs. Kushuthara is an elaboration of the plain striped thara weave on a white ground.
How it works
The cloth is woven on a backstrap loom using an extra-weft technique called thrima or trima. The weaver lifts selected warp threads with a stick and coils colored weft threads around them in a discontinuous way. This raises the motifs above the surface, so the result is often mistaken for chain-stitch embroidery, and the motifs show only on the front. Traditional pieces used a white silk ground with red and blue thread dyed with lac and indigo. A piece is woven in three panels that are sewn together lengthwise. A densely patterned one can take up to a year.
How it spread
Kushuthara was popularized after Ugyen Wangchuck became the first king of Bhutan in 1907. His family came from Kurtoe and the women of the family wore kushuthara kira on formal occasions. The nobility adopted the fabric and other classes followed. Queens and noblewomen employed skilled weavers on palace staff. From about the middle of the twentieth century it was made on blue, green, red and black grounds as well as white.
Where it stands today
The kira was declared the national dress for Bhutanese women in 1989, and kushuthara kira are typically worn on special occasions. Weavers now use synthetic dyes and imported yarn, and cotton or synthetic grounds make the cloth more affordable. Weavers in Khoma report competition from inexpensive machine-made textiles with Bhutanese patterns. The Textile Museum and the Royal Textile Academy of Bhutan support the craft, and girls in Khoma still learn it from their mothers.
