Interviews • Carpet Weavers in Kerman • IRAN

Traditional carpet weavers from Kerman, Iran, discuss and demonstrate their ancient craft. Watch the short documentary here: • Video
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SUMMARY
Four interviews illuminate the beauty and struggle which traditional carpet weaving faces today in Kerman, Iran. While the retired Abol Hadi still weaves out of passion, a group of women on the edge of the desert weave to survive, earning less than 1 US dollar per day. In a posh retail store, Mr. Mohammad Heravi sells finished carpets but only a few blocks away, antique weaving equipment sits collecting dust at the Kerman Carpet Company.
BACKGROUND
Because machine-made carpets are so much cheaper to manufacture, demand for hand-woven carpets has fallen. With this decline, the ancient skill of weaving carpets by hand is slowly dying out.
After retiring from the Kerman Carpet Company as a technical carpet inspector, the 72-year old Abol Hadi has started work on one last, giant tapestry. “Most professionals don’t believe that this carpet has two knots per millimeter. But when I sit here it’s just me, this flower, and this carpet - Otherwise I wouldn’t be able to do this”.
For a group of women living on the edge of the desert, weaving is a way out of poverty. They earn 25,000 Toman, less than 1 US dollar, per day. “It’s enough to support their families”, says Mr. Afzalinejad, who manages a number of carpet workshops in villages around Kerman. “Without this money they’d starve,” he says.
Mr. Heravi buys and commissions hand-woven carpets exclusively from local Kerman weavers. His up-scale shop in the center of town is layered with carpets showing rural motives, designs traditionally seen in carpets crafted in and around Kerman.
A few streets away is the once mighty Kerman Carpet Company. 100 years ago the factory belonged to the British East India Company. Now, antique, steam-driven machines gather dust in the warehouse. The Kerman Carpet Company retains a skeleton crew, hand-weaving primarily for the export market, but due to cost-cutting measures, they had to let many weavers go.

[@markpark1445]

It's too bad you cut out so much of it -- especially since you cut out so much of the shots of the carpets. Have you thought if putting it all back in and chopping it into many episodes? I would warch the whole thing. This is a dying art and you have some great footage. You should put it all on to preserve it for history.

[@oxlaey]

Thanks Mark Park for the positive words!