Ghalamkar

Ghalamkar fabric is a type of textile print, with patterns typical of Iranian fabric. The fabric is printed with geometric patterned wooden stamps. The stamps are mostly made of pear wood which has greater flexibility and density for carving and the usefulness of a long life. In this workshop, there are hundreds of different patterns composed of arabesque designs, flora and fauna designs, geometric designs, pre-Islamic designs, hunting scenes, polo games, Persian poems, Armenian and Hebrew inscriptions. The Ghalamkar technique is also known as Kalamkari in India, which is basically a type of hand-painted or block-painted cotton fabric. Esfahan (Iran) is one of the most important producing cities in the world.

A tapestry can be printed depending on its density and size, between hundreds and tens of thousands of times. For example, a six-person tablecloth (2 meters by 1,4 meters) should be printed about 580 times in a normal job, up to 4000 times if it was an elegant work.

After having finished printing they are then, in the first phase, steamed for at least an hour in order to stabilize their designs; subsequently they are brought to the river bed and kept in some basins to be well immersed in a large quantity of running water. The pieces are piled up in large copper vessels containing stabilizers (liquids) and are finally boiled. At the same time, they are knocked over by some wooden sticks and washed again in the Zayandeh, the river that runs through the city of Esfahan, and then scattered on its banks to dry them.