Great photos of Walnut wood carving,Heritage of Kashmir

June 15, 2015

I never knew Kashmir was home to some of the best walnut wood carving in the world.I've heard that walnut trees are not growing in any other place in India except for Kashmir valley.It's a unique wood for carving in terms of color and flexibility to work on it.The different parts of the walnut tree has different colors.The root has almost black color and is the most expensive one.

Wood carving is done on a variety of objects from tables, chairs, writing desks, dining tables , cigarette boxes, jewelry boxes, photo frames and a lot of other decorative objects.You just name it!

You could find varieties of wooden handicrafts with various motifs from Kashmir flowers and plants.Though they are mostly Muslims,it's nice to see even Hindu symbols,and also wooden statues of mythical Hindu god and goddesses.

Wood carving is also done on the doors, walls and windows of traditional Kashmiri houses and their beautiful house boats.I've been told that British who came to Kashmir valley to scape the heat of summer ,came to know that they were not allowed to build houses for themselves .That's why they built house boats and asked the Kashmiri craftsmen to decorate them!

You can see fine examples in the beautiful Prince of Kashmir house boat which I stayed there for one week.

The best Kashmiri woodcarving is called Khatam-band which is exactly Farsi(Persian) word and we have this art in Iran!

Khatam-band refers to the carvings of relief patterns on the ceilings of rooms.I'm sure they have learned this art from Persian Artisans came to Kashmir from 14th century onwards. This craft is passed from one generation of houseboats builders to another. You can find great example of it in the famous shrine of Khwaja Naqshband( it's also Farsi name), near the Jama Masjid of Srinagar.