The Chengdu machine used 10,470 longitudinal warp threads controlled by 86 brown "programming" patches, governing more than 9.6 million intersections with the latitudinal weft threads. China addressed this challenge early on through mechanisation, which established it as the world's silk production centre. Each node acted as a command, precisely controlling which warp threads to lift, thereby revealing the predetermined design through the interlacing of warp and weft. Beyond the exquisite patterns it produced, the scientific thinking embedded in the figure loom is even more remarkable. In the 19th century, the punched cards of the automatic figure loom also inspired programming methods for early computers.

Source: Bangkok Post January 02, 2026 12:23 UTC