How long it takes depends entirely on the piece. A plain weave moves quickly. A piece carrying pattern across its whole length does not. The loom sets the pace and we have never found a way to argue with it, so we do not quote a number we would have to break.
The grade of each is picked for the piece, not ordered in bulk and used for everything. A light drape needs a thinner cotton than a piece meant to hold structure. The silk is degummed first so it will take colour evenly.Dyeing finished cloth is faster and cheaper, and it is why colour on most garments sits on the surface and lifts in the wash. Dyed in the skein, the colour goes into the thread itself. Then it dries in the open and is checked against daylight.Too fast and the thread stretches. Too loose and it tangles on the loom two days later. This is usually the work of the women of the house, done alongside everything else the day requires.Every thread that will run the length of the cloth is wound onto a wooden drum at one constant tension, then rolled onto the loom. Get the tension wrong here and every metre after it is wrong. It is the least visible part of the process and the part that decides the cloth.Thousands of them, one at a time, then through a comb that holds them evenly apart. Two people work facing each other, one passing the thread through, the other catching it. It is the reason a loom that is already set up is never taken apart casually.The loom is set into the floor with a pit beneath it for the weaver's legs. Husband and wife work it together through the day, changing places. One weaves while the other winds or sets up the next run of pattern. Neither of them is the assistant.A separate small spool is picked up for each motif, and the weaving resumes after. A single figure can take as long as a stretch of plain cloth many times its size. This is the step that makes a length of Chanderi take the time it takes, and the step nobody sees.Light is the only reliable way to find a dropped thread. After that it comes to us and is cut for you, because it was only woven once you asked for it. Nothing sits in a warehouse waiting to be marked down.
The days that piece took are written on the piece, not on this page.