Central Asian

Silk chain stitch on handwoven cotton, often worked in strips by several women and joined at the end. Central Asian textiles here are suzani embroideries, bedding ornaments, ikat coats and felt from Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan. Suzani hangings, some from Surkhandarya in southern Uzbekistan, were made as part of a bride’s dowry and hung or spread at weddings and on household walls. Bugzhoma and segusha are smaller embroidered pieces made to wrap or dress the stacked bedding kept against the wall of an Uzbek home.

A lined Uzbek ikat chapan, a woman’s winter coat from the late 19th century, shows the bold dyeing of silk and cotton for which the region is known, and a Turkmen Koran cover is made from camel felt and wool. A suzani can cover a whole wall above a bed or sofa, and a segusha framed in plexi suits a narrow spot by a doorway. They were made to announce a household, and they still do.