Paisley (design)

Some design scholars believe the buta is the convergence of a stylized floral spray and a cypress tree: a Zoroastrian symbol of life and eternity.

In these periods, the pattern was used to decorate royal regalia, crowns, and court garments, as well as textiles used by the general population.

[citation needed] Persian and Central Asian designs usually range the motifs in orderly rows, with a plain background.

The early Indo-Iranian people flourished in South Asia, where they eventually exchanged linguistic, cultural, and even religious similarities.

argue, served as one of the earliest influences for boteh jegheh's design with the shape representing the cypress tree, an ancient Zoroastrian religious symbol.

[11] It has been stated that during Emperor Akbars reign over the Mughal empire, boteh jegheh shawls were extremely popular and fashionable.

[12] The first place in the Western world to imitate the design was the town of Paisley in Scotland, Europe's top producer of textiles at this time.

[14] Records indicate that William Moorcroft, an English businessman and explorer, visited the Himalayan mountains in the mid-1800s; upon his arrival, he was enthralled by Boteh-adorned Kashmir shawls and tried to arrange for entire families of Indian textile workers to move to the United Kingdom.

The design was copied from the costly silk and wool Kashmir shawls and adapted first for use on handlooms, and, after 1820,[15] on Jacquard looms.

Unique additions to their hand-looms and Jacquard looms allowed them to work in five colours when most weavers were producing paisley using only two.

[17] In this process, the paisley pattern was printed, rather than woven, onto other textiles, including cotton squares which were the precursors of the modern bandanna.

[21] The motif also influences furniture design internationally, with many countries applying paisley decoration to wallpaper, pillows, curtains, bed spreads, and like furnishings.

In the mid- to late 1960s, paisley became identified with psychedelic style and enjoyed mainstream popularity, partly due to the Beatles.

[28] In Persian, Boteh can be translated to shrub or bush, while in Kashmir it carried the same meaning but was referred to as Buta, or Bu.

[10] The modern French words for paisley are boteh (meaning bush, cluster of leaves or a flower bud) [29] in Persian as well as cachemire (Cachemire (tissu) [fr]) and palme ("palm", which – along with the pine and the cypress – is one of the traditional botanical motifs thought to have influenced the shape of the paisley element as it is now known).[4].