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Nepali Dhaka Topi

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Dhaka cloth is woven, not printed. A second coloured weft rides alongside the ground weft in selected sheds, so every white diamond and every red hit is structure — you can feel it from the back of the cloth. The brimless topi cut from it became Nepal's national cap.

This system works the same way. Black cotton is the page. Pattern arrives in weft rows, quantised to a vertical rhythm, never floating free. Red and white carry the load; orange punctuates; green and blue appear rarely enough to register as events.

Learn more about the Nepali Dhaka Topi style

  • OriginEastern Nepal — Terhathum, Palpa/Tansen, Dhankuta
  • Period1900–1950 for the pattern vocabulary and the cap as national dress; acrylic brightening only after 1980
  • DesignerLimbu women weavers · Terhathum household weavers · Dhankuta cooperative weavers
  • MovementsSouth Asian supplementary-weft inlay weaving · Nepali national dress codification

Web examples

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Slide examples

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