Imitating Madras

While there is little evidence to suggest South Indian weavers attempted to imitate tartan, there is ample evidence of European weavers attempting to imitate Madras. The global popularity of South Indian checked cottons, and especially checked cotton handkerchiefs, made them prime targets for European manufacturers looking to compete in the international textile trade.

From the early 1700s onwards, manufacturing centres all over Europe used a combination of industrial machinery and cheap cotton grown on American and Indian plantations to produce imitations of South Indian Madras. These machine-made imitations were sold worldwide; some openly as European products and others as knock-off South Indian. Industrial manufacturing had significant impacts on South Indian handloom weavers, whose production costs were undercut, and on international consumers, who struggled to differentiate between authentic and imitation Madras.