He sells Tibetan Rugs from the Rooftop of the World

- Tibetan merchant givesback to his community

- by WARREN JOHNSTON, February 20. 2005

In 1986, Kesang Tashi found his niche. Tashi, who lives in Hanover, gave up a career in banking and gave in to his calling - to be a merchant, an international trader and to perhaps, make a piece of the world a better place.

"I come from a merchant background. It's in my blood. My grandfather ran a horse caravan through the mountains of Tibet," he said recently during an interview at his Bridgewater Mill, Vt., showroom. "I wanted to start my own business. I wanted to do something that would be satisfying."

So Tashi set the goal of developing a "sustainable commercial enterprise in Tibet that would provide profit and other tangible benefits to Tibetans."

He went into the rug business and took a fading 1,200-year-old craft and rebuilt it. He restored a heritage of weaving practices and ancient rug designs. He created 250 jobs for artisans and several hundred for subcontractors. He estimates the enterprise is providing a livelihood for more than 3,000 Tibetans who live in an area now officially renamed Shangri-la.

In 1986, the economy of Tibet was foundering under China's Cultural Revolution. In order to survive, weavers had turned to making cheap, poorly crafted rugs, to sell to tourists and the outside Chinese markets.

Tashi started InnerAsia Trading Co. He arranged with existing rug makers to reproduce hand-woven heirloom designs and to return to the quality of rug that the region had once produced.

"Tibetans have been weaving rugs and working wool for centuries. I convinced the master weavers to go back to their heritage. I said if you produce the rugs, I'll make sure there's a market for them."

InnerAsia began selling Gangchen Carpets of Tibet on the international market, but some of the rugs were of poor quality and couldn't be sold. "I gave the design specifications for the rugs to some of the oldest factories that were there, but I couldn't control the quality."

It became clear that InnerAsia couldn't have quality without having the controlling interest in the factory.

Tashi hooked up with a local minority partner. In 1994, they established the first U.S.-China joint venture in Tibet. They built the Khawachen Carpet and Wool Handcraft Co. in Lhasa, the commercial center of the area.

Tashi brought in his sister, Doma Chodun, who has a fine arts degree from the University of Wisconsin, to train and organize the weavers, create production systems and establish work flow.

By the following year, the company had showrooms in Japan, Hong Kong, Shanghai, Germany, Australia, New Zealand and the United States. InnerAsia recently opened additional showrooms in Manchester, Vt., and in Bridgewater.

The Khawachen facility now has some satellite weaving operations, Tashi said, noting that InnerAsia's factories can produce about 4,000 square yards of heirloom and custom-designed hand-woven rugs a month during peak times.

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Rooftop of the world

Tibet, which sits just north of India and Nepal, is large - about three times the size of Texas - and because of its average elevation of 13,000 feet, it's isolated.

Tibet, known as the "rooftop of the world" was ruled by a series of Buddhist leaders, Dalai Lamas, until the Communist Chinese started running things in the 1950s. They finally ran the 14th Dalai Lama out in 1959. He fled to northern India. Tashi and his family were not far behind.

"We had to escape under the guise of going on a pilgrimage to northern India. We lost everything," Tashi said.

While in India, Tashi attended a Scottish Presbyterian school and happened to meet a 1956 Dartmouth graduate who was working there for the Ford Foundation. The class of '56 had just set up a scholarship for foreign-born students.

Tashi was one of the first recipients of the scholarship, and on Sept. 13, 1966, he was in Hanover attending his freshman year at Dartmouth. He got a bachelor's degree in East Asian studies three years later and then a master's degree in cultural anthropology from the University of Wisconsin.

He moved back to Hanover three months ago.

After thinking about a career in academia and spending six years in international banking, he embarked on the rug business. By 1986, the Chinese Communists were getting tired of keeping the lid on Tibet. It was getting expensive to put down riots, and they had killed 1.2 million Tibetans and destroyed more than 6,200 monasteries and nunneries. They had absorbed most of the Tibetan area into China, sent more than 100,000 Tibetans to labor camps in China, and cut down forests of trees. The economy was in shambles. Agricultural "reform" had resulted in mass starvation.

'Selling a dream'

After giving tax incentives to Chinese who would move to Tibet and getting 100,000 people to take up residence there, the Communist government began to ease religious restrictions and open the region to tourists and outside trade.

When Tashi returned to Tibet, things had changed. The influence of the Chinese had badly eroded Tibetan culture. Weavers were producing cheap rugs with machine-spun wool and were using poor dyes.

"It was a challenging time,"Tashi said. "Tibet was a political backwater. It was hard to get anything done. There were one or two fledgling factories, but the master weavers had forgotten their art."

With the backing of his savings account and money from friends and family, Tashi bought some samples and entered the fiercely competitive New York rug market.

"I was selling a dream. I also was selling quality. Handmade rugs are distinctive from those made on a machine. These are things to keep a lifetime," he said.

InnerAsia got some national press in such publications as Architectural Digest and House and Garden, which helped jump-start the business.

In 1994, when Tashi built the Khawachen factory, he designed it in keeping with the Tibetan landscape. "It is like a Tibetan hacienda." The two-story stucco and wood structure is built around a large courtyard and has big windows, porches and a red-tiled roof. It looks more like a school than a factory.

"Now, we're the only company that is producing Tibetan rugs in Tibet. Most are made in Nepal."

The business has had its good and bad years, depending on the economy and after 9/11, but overall it has been good, Tashi said. "It's had its ups and downs, but I would not trade it for working in a bank."

Changphel sheep

Tibetan rugs are different from other Oriental rugs not only because of the designs and craftsmanship, but also because of the wool.

The weavers at Khawachen use wool from the Tibetan semi-wild changphel sheep that are raised at 17,000 feet above sea level by nomadic herdsmen. Because of their environment, the sheep grow long-fibered, thick wool, which has a heavy lanolin content and is naturally varigated, Tashi said.

"What that means is that the wool is stronger than other commercially grown wools. It has a beautiful textured appearance when it's dyed and woven."

The wool is hand carded (combed) and spun.

Tibetan textiles are known for their brilliant blues, greens, yellows and reds, and the rugs are no exception. Tashi brings in Swiss dyes that replicate the heirloom Tibetan colors. The wool is dyed at the factory in large copper pots before it is hand tied into 60-, 80- or 100-knot rugs with dense pile.

The designs vary greatly from floral and fruit patterns to those that are more geometric. There are others that represent nature with swirling clouds and demon tigers and snow leopards.

InnerAsia also offers a line of contemporary designs and has a custom rug program, which allows customers to design their own rugs.

Giving back

In 1995, as a commitment to his hometown of Gyalthang, Tashi built a 45-room hotel, the Gyalthang Dzong Hotel, which has an emphasis on promoting eco-tourism and Tibetan culture.

The rooms in the boutique hotel face inward toward a courtyard, which hosts al fresco dining and an informal outdoor space. The interior decor uses vibrant Tibetan colors and ethnic textiles.

The views from the rooms are spectacular, the hotel Web site says.

The hotel has become a meeting place for nature conservationists, botanists, students of anthropology and hikers, Tashi said. The hotel underwent complete renovation in 2003 and is managed by Banyan Tree Resorts' subsidiary Angsana Resorts and Spa. Rooms range from $120 to $190 depending on the season.

In addition to the hotel, Tashi is working with the local government and the Nature Conservancy USA to assist conservation efforts in an area of Yunnan Province, which is four times the size of Yellowstone National Park.

The area contains many rare and endangered plants and animals, such as the golden monkey, snow panther and the lesser panda. The project includes the Gylthang area, Nature Conservancy spokesman Ron Geatz said last week.

For the past nine years, Tashi has been involved with the project, and he hopes to continue his efforts and have a larger volunteer role in the future.

Tashi also hopes to get Dartmouth students involved with Tibet and the conservation project. The discussions are in the very early stages, he said.

Through his business in Bridgewater, InnerSanctuary, Tashi, too, is attempting to get involved with the community.

The store will make a contribution to an upcoming fund-raiser for the Thompson Senior Center.

In recent years, Tashi has co-authored a book, Of Wool and Loom - The Tradition of Tibetan Rugs; he frequently lectures on Tibetan rugs in museums and he is taking part in a series of seminars on socially responsible investment in Tibet at Columbia University. He's working on another book about three generations of Khampa merchants.

Tashi and his wife, Tse Dan, moved back to Hanover late last year from New York. He had wanted to make the move for some time, but always found excuses. "The school system is good here. The environment is healthy, and the people are wonderful. It's a totally different way of life than in New York."

- by WARREN JOHNSTON, February 20. 2005

Source: Concord Monitor Online