Buying pashmina in Srinagar without being sold a blend

What the word actually means

Pashmina is the undercoat of the Changthangi goat, which lives high on the Ladakh plateau and grows it to survive winters that would kill most animals. It is combed out by hand in spring, a few grams per goat per year, and that scarcity is the whole story — it is why real pashmina costs what it does and why so much of what is sold under the name is not it.

The fibre is spun and woven in Kashmir, which is how a Ladakhi goat became a Srinagar industry. A genuine hand-spun, hand-woven shawl takes weeks of someone's life. Price it against that rather than against the shop next door.

What you are more likely to be shown

Most shawls sold as pashmina in tourist-facing shops are blends — pashmina mixed with silk, or with viscose, or simply fine wool with the word attached to it. A silk blend is not a scandal: it drapes well, it is cheaper, and plenty of people prefer it. It just is not pashmina, and it should not be priced as though it were.

The problem is not that blends exist. It is that nobody volunteers which one you are holding.

The tests, and which are nonsense

You will be shown the ring test — a shawl pulled through a finger ring to prove its fineness. It is a genuine demonstration of thinness, and a fine silk blend passes it just as happily. It proves less than the performance suggests.

What is worth more: look at the weave against the light. Hand-woven pashmina is slightly irregular, because a person made it. Machine weave is perfectly even. Feel the warmth rather than the softness — pashmina is startlingly warm for its weight, which is the property it was bred for. And a genuine shawl has no sheen; silk blends glint.

The only test that settles it is a laboratory one, which is why the Government of India gives genuine Kashmiri pashmina a GI tag, and why certified pieces carry a mark. Ask whether a piece is GI-marked and watch how the answer is given.

Kani and sozni, which are a separate thing

Beyond the fibre is the work on it. Sozni is needle embroidery, worked so finely that a good shawl takes a year or more and the reverse is nearly as clean as the front. Kani is woven rather than embroidered, on a loom using small wooden sticks, and a full kani shawl can take two people several years.

These are the pieces worth buying if you are buying one thing. They are also the ones most worth seeing even if you buy nothing.

Where to go

The old city around Lal Chowk is where the trade lives, and the workshops behind the shopfronts are where the work is actually done. Asking to see someone weaving is usually welcomed, and it tells you more than any sales patter.

The government emporium is the low-pressure option — fixed prices, no haggling, and nobody follows you to the car. You will pay a little more than a hard bargain elsewhere and you will know what you are getting.

Tell us before you go and we will point you at people we would use ourselves.

What else is worth carrying home

Papier-mache, which in Kashmir means layers of paper burnished to a lacquer finish and painted in miniature — boxes, bowls, ornaments. Walnut wood, carved deep and heavy enough that you will think about your baggage allowance. Saffron from Pampore, bought where it is grown rather than where it is sold to tourists. And Kashmiri willow cricket bats, if that means anything to you.