Pashmina refers to a type of fine cashmere wool and the textiles made from it. The name comes from Pashmineh, made from Persian pashm ("wool")."Pashmina." The Oxford English Dictionary. 2nd ed. 1989. The wool comes from changthangi or pashmina goat, which is a special breed of goat indigenous to high altitudes of the Himalayas. Pashmina shawls are hand spun, woven and embroidered in Kashmir, and made from fine cashmere fiber.

History

The fiber is also known as pashm or pashmina for its use in the handmade shawls of Kashmir. The woolen shawls made from wool in Kashmir find written mention between 3rd century BC and the 11th century AD.Encyclopedia Britannica (2008). kashmir shawl. However, the founder of the cashmere wool industry is traditionally held to be the 15th century ruler of Kashmir, Zayn-ul-Abidin, who introduced weavers from Central Asia.

Cashmere shawls have been manufactured in Nepal and Kashmir for thousands of years. The test for a quality pashmina is warmth and feel.

Pashmina has recently enjoyed a spike in popularity due to comedian Andy Samberg's part in The Lonely Island's music video, "I'm on a Boat". He references the fabric by saying, "I'm on a boat and I'm going fast and I've got a nautical themed pashmina afghan!"

Production

To meet the demand, the goats are now commercially reared in the Gobi Desert area in Inner and Outer Mongolia. The region has identical harsh weather conditions to those of the Himalayan region, and is thereby apt for the goats to grow this inner wool, but also has acres of grazing ground to produce cashmere economically and commercially. During spring (the molting season) the goats shed this inner wool, which regrows in winter. The inner wool is collected and spun to produce cashmere. The quality of the cashmere produced in the Gobi Desert is just as high as that produced in the Himalayas, while the costs are less.

Pashmina products

A pashmina shawl can range in cost from as little as about $35US for a pure pashmina scarf or up to thousands of $US for a super high-quality pure pashmina shawl. They are known for their softness and warmth. A craze for pashminas in the mid-1990s resulted in high demand for pashminas, so demand exceeded supply.

When pashmina shawls rose into fashion prominence during the mid-'90s, they were marketed dubiously. Cashmere used for pashmina shawls was claimed to be of a superior quality, which was really due to the enhanced sheen and softness that the fabric (cashmere blended with silk) had. In the consuming markets, pashmina shawls were redefined as a shawl/wrap with cashmere and silk, notwithstanding the actual meaning of pashmina. Some shawls marketed as pashmina shawls contain wool, while other unscrupulous companies marketed the man-made fabric viscose as "pashmina" with deceptive marketing statements such as "authentic viscose pashmina".