Fragment of a textile, twill, silk and metal lamella spun around a silk core

The fondness for using metal thread in large sections of the background color gives many Safavid silk textiles a characteristic “cool” character in comparison with contemporary Ottoman fabrics, for example. In addition, the plants are generally quite stylized and can only rarely be related to real-life species.

The same delicate bouquet is repeated in rows on this textile. The color combinations vary, and the bouquet is turned as a mirror image in every second row, as is the name of the weaver/designer. It is found very discretely in the center of one of the flowers in each bouquet: “made by Saifi.” Saifi Abbasi’s name