AN OTTOMAN BROCADED BARBER ROBE
PROPERTY FROM A PRIVATE LONDON COLLECTOR
Ottoman Turkey, late 18th - 19th century

Of rounded arched shape, the crimson silk ground brocaded with gilt thread wound around a yellow silk core with a repeating trellis grid containing hatched discs, lined in light green cotton stamp-glazed with floral arrangements, 65cm x 48cm.

This Ottoman barber robe of brocaded crimson silk would have turned a few shaved heads in a double-take. The type may be familiar in Ottoman inventories, but the small-scale brocade is no ‘Kemha’. Indeed, smaller-scale Ottoman weaves had long disappeared by the 18th century, possibly placing this robe in a late Safavid prince’s wardrobe instead. The survival of such textiles, even in fragmentary form, is a great gift both to the eyes and to the minds of textile aficionados: whilst we admire their designs and glittering weaves, we can also learn so much about the fashion of the time and their use, getting a phenomenal insight into the Zeitgeist of the Safavids, Qajars, and Ottomans.