
1970s · 1970s · British
Designer
Mr Fish
Production
ready-to-wear
Material
printed silk
Culture
British
Movement
Counterculture · Hippie / Counterculture
Influences
Middle Eastern kaftan · 1960s psychedelic prints
A floor-length kaftan constructed from lightweight printed silk featuring an all-over geometric medallion pattern in burgundy and cream tones. The garment displays a loose, flowing silhouette with wide kimono-style sleeves and a deep V-neckline. The fabric drapes freely from the shoulders without waist definition, creating an unstructured, relaxed fit typical of 1970s leisure wear. The repeating circular motifs appear to be machine-printed in a symmetrical grid layout across the entire surface. The kaftan represents the era's embrace of non-Western garment forms and psychedelic-influenced textile designs, reflecting both the counterculture movement's interest in Eastern aesthetics and the period's bold approach to pattern and color in fashion.
These two kaftans reveal how the 1970s counterculture movement created an unlikely visual convergence between Palestinian embroidery traditions and British textile printing. The Israeli kaftan's hand-stitched geometric florals across the chest and sleeves echo the same diamond-and-cross motifs that appear in the British kaftan's all-over silk print—one painstakingly embroidered in the ancient Palestinian tatreez style, the other mass-produced through Western printing techniques.
Follow this garment wherever the graph leads
Lineage: “Middle Eastern kaftan”
The white organza kaftan with its bold black satin stripes represents the authentic Middle Eastern tradition that inspired a generation of Western designers during the 1970s counterculture movement, while the burgundy silk kaftan with its geometric print shows how British designers absorbed and reinterpreted that silhouette through their own decorative lens.

