Dar al-Kiswa

[1] The kiswah and other sacred textiles were conveyed each year across the hundreds of miles of desert from Cairo to Mecca on camels among the Hajj pilgrims.

At its peak at the start of the 20th century, the workshop employed over a hundred craftsmen to make textiles for the holy sites.

For 750 AH (1349–50 AD) onwards, an endowment created by the Mamluk sultan As-Salih Ismail set aside the revenue of three Egyptian villages to fund a new covering of the Kaaba each year, and coverings for the Prophet's tomb and for the minbar (pulpit) of the Prophet's mosque, which were replaced every five years.

[1] Originally it was the Warshat al-Khoronfesh, a large complex employing around 4,000 craftsmen to make many kinds of textiles.

In 1953 the workshop became part of the Egyptian Ministry of Endowments and its name changed to Dar al-Kiswa al-Sharifa ("House of the noble Kiswah").

[1] There were strict procedures in place to keep track of the valuable silver wire, including weighing the input materials and finished textiles.

The embroiderers made various special textiles for royal clients, including a dress for Queen Nazli of Egypt and a door curtain for a daughter of the sultan of Brunei.

[10] They would divide themselves in two groups sitting opposite to each other and perform ablution, then rinse their hands with rose water, recite the Qur’anic chapter of Fatiha and start their work that took one year to be finished.The workshop sent examples of its work to national and international exhibitions, winning awards.

[2] In the 1920s, King Abd Al-Aziz (Ibn Saud) opened a textile factory in Mecca; in 1927, a kiswah produced directly in Saudi Arabia was used for the first time.

[11][2] Since the end of the relationship in 1962, the Mecca factory has been where the sacred textiles are produced, using a combination of traditional crafts and modern digital technology.

[2] The Dar al-Kiswa officially closed in 1997; the building which housed it is now a storage space for the Egyptian Ministry of Endowments and, as of 2017, has fallen into disrepair.

[3][2] The Khalili Collection of Hajj and the Arts of Pilgrimage includes some of the textiles produced by the workshop as well as materials used in their production and archival documents.

These materials include paper stencils used as templates for the embroidery, tools, and coils of silver wire.