REMINDER: SPECIAL INTEREST DAY - Unravelling the Silk Road on Tuesday 11th March 2025, with Chris Aslan

The day comprises three lectures, two in the morning, starting at 10.45am, and one in the afternoon, with a closing time of about 3.15pm.  A sandwich lunch is included  as well as a barista coffee or tea.

If you have any questions please contact Diana Jones, who organises our Special Interest Days.

Three textile roads tangle their way through Central Asia. The famous Silk Road united east and west through trade. Older still was the Wool Road, of critical importance when houses made of wool enabled nomads to travers the inhospitable winter steppes. Then there was the Cotton Road, marked by greed, colonialism and environmental disaster. At this intersection of human history, fortunes were made and lost through shimmering silks, life giving felts and gossamer cottons.

At this SID, each lecture will explore a textile and a road. We will examine how textiles have changed the course of Central Asian history, politics and way of life. We will also revel in the intoxicating designs, colours and techniques achieved with these three textiles. 

Chris Aslan, who has spent fifteen years living and working in this region, will unravel the strands of this tangled history and embroider them with his own experiences of life in the heart of Asia. Chris will attempt to justify his bold assertion that ‘everything is about textiles’.