In the late 20th century, they evolved to middle-class popularity through generic cashmere products (rather than the higher-grade pashmina), and raffal, shawls woven in the Kashmiri style, but using thicker Merino wool.

Valued for its warmth, light weight and characteristic buta design, the Kashmir shawl trade inspired the global cashmere industry.

In the late 18th century, it arrived in Britain, and then in France, where its use by Queen Victoria and Empress Joséphine popularised it as a symbol of exotic luxury and status.

[1] However, the Kashmir shawl's definition has varied in time and place, depending on various factors such as the material used and its cost, the method of construction, the intended use, and the status of the wearer.

In the West, depending on the fashion of the moment, the Kashmir shawl represented different types of commodities, originally worn by men, but thereafter by women and then as decorative items in interior design.

In the late 19th century AD, weavers who had migrated to Punjab set up an imitation industry, applying the Kashmiri technique to Merino wool.

[3] More recently, in the late 1990s, western European and American sellers adopted the more exotic word pashmina to sell plain-weave shawls made from generic cashmere.

[1] In 1526, Babur (1483–1530) founded the Mughal Empire in India, and established the practice of giving khil'at (or "robes of honour", typically made of expensive fabric) to members of their durbar to indicate high service, great achievement, or royal favour.

[1] Under Babur, the Mughal khil'at was a set of clothes, which could include a turban, long coat, gown, fitted jacket, sash, shawl, trousers, shirt, and scarf.

[4] In the Iranian elite, both men and women wore Kashmir shawl fabric as fitted clothes, rather than as a loose covering of the upper body.

[4] He encouraged Kashmiri weavers to settle in Punjabi cities, and used Kashmir shawl cloth to pay allowances to his followers, to grant robes of honour, and to send gifts to other rulers, including the British.

[4] The Kashmir shawl arrived in Europe towards the second half of the 18th century AD, by English and French individuals active in the Indian subcontinent.

In 1852, Charles Dickens wrote in the magazine Household Words that "if an article of dress could be immutable, it would be the (Kashmir) shawl; designed for eternity in the unchanging East; copied from patterns which are the heirlooms of caste; and woven by fatalists, to be worn by adorers of the ancient garment, who resent the idea of the smallest change".

[11] Kashmir shawls thereby came to play different roles in the two societies: a status symbol for Indian men, and a luxury garment for European noblewomen.

[1] In Vanity Fair, Jos Sedley returns from Bengal with a "white Cashmere shawl", an indication that it was an original, as imitations were generally patterned.

[19] When Margaret met her future husband, Gaskell described her attire as completed by "a large Indian shawl which hung about her in heavy folds and which she wore as an empress wears her drapery".

Since English law restricted women's abilities to inherit land, the Kashmir shawl served as an item of high exchange value that a woman could carry.

[4] As a class marker, they fulfilled 19th century French tastes because they looked rich, had extensive ornamentation, artistic qualities, and were made of expensive raw materials.

[4] Unmarried women were discouraged from wearing Kashmir shawls because doing so would "lead people to believe that they are possessed of an unbridled love of luxury and deprive themselves of the pleasure of receiving such finery from a husband".

[4] Around the time the Kashmir shawl became fashionable in Britain, Euro-American women on the northeastern coast of the United States began wearing them.

[11] A talcum powder named "Cashmere Bouquet" is still sold by an American mail order business which specializes in commodity nostalgia, with an advertisement situating the product in the 1870s.

[4] Over time, repeated European and Euro-American usage disassociated the word "cashmere" from its geographical origin and may have weakened its link to the "exotic".