Fergana Valley

Fenced by mountains on almost every side, the Fergana Valley is Uzbekistan's most densely populated and most fertile region — and its craft heartland. In Margilan, family workshops still hand-weave ikat silk on wooden looms using resist-dye methods largely unchanged for generations. In Rishtan, potters dig the region's distinctive red clay and glaze it with a blue-green pigment found almost nowhere else, a tradition documented since the 10th century.