Every thread remembers a hand.

Dhaka is woven on narrow pit looms. Each diamond is picked out by hand with a separate bobbin of coloured weft, so no two lengths are ever quite alike. A skilled weaver in Tansen finishes perhaps half a metre of fine topi cloth a day.

The patterns look like pure geometry, but weavers read them like a language: mountain peaks, temple steps, the eye of a bird. Many families keep their own motifs and pass them from grandmother to granddaughter by memory rather than on paper.

"The loom counts for you. You only have to remember why."Weaver, Tansen (composite portrait)

Power looms can copy the look at a tenth of the price. The difference shows at the edges: a hand-woven diamond has a tiny floating weft where the bobbin turns back, and that small imperfection is how you know a person was there.

In the courtyards around Patan's Durbar Square, statues begin as beeswax models carved by hand. They are coated in clay, heated until the wax runs out, and filled with molten copper alloy. Each mould is broken to free the statue, so every piece is the only one of its kind.

After casting comes the long work: chasing detail with tiny chisels, mercury-free fire gilding, and finally painting the face. Painting the eyes is left to the end, and in many workshops it is still treated as the moment the figure comes to life.

An 8-inch Buddha can take six weeks and pass through five pairs of hands. When you buy one, ask how many.