From India to Europe
These printed cottons began arriving in Europe as part of the valuable East Indies trade in the early 1600s. At first, they represented only a very small portion of that trade. It is estimated that in 1643, only 80–100 lengths were sold in England.
But tastes were changing.
By around 1650, the East India Company was requesting designs with lighter backgrounds and flowers more familiar to English buyers. The fabrics became enormously fashionable, particularly among wealthy consumers.
In fact, they became too popular for England’s competing textile industries.
Wool and linen merchants pressured Parliament for restrictions on imported and printed cottons, resulting in a series of restrictions and prohibitions during the 18th century. France experienced a similar struggle as its wool and silk industries sought protection from the increasingly popular printed cottons.
Palampores were a regular feature of the eighteenth-century chintz trade to Europe, where they were prized as wall hangings and bed and table coverings. They typically show a central flower-and-fruit-bearing serpentine tree emerging from a hillock with stylized peaks or rocks.
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