Small Indian town's unlikely carpet connection to Met Gala

Cherthala, a coastal town in Kerala, India, is the home of carpet company Neyett. For the third time, this handwoven carpet maker was chosen to supply the carpets for the annual New York Met Gala.

The carpet for the 2025 gala was a massive 63,000 square feet that covered the Metropolitan Museum of Art's entrance.

Neyett was established in 2019 by Nimisha Srinivas and Sivan Santhosh who wanted to revive traditional weaving techniques. Sivan Santhosh's family has a long tradition of carpet making. His great-grandfather K Velayudhan created a matting company in 1917. The family has supplied carpets for Camp David in the USA and palaces in Saudi Arabia.

When Neyett was established, traditional Indian carpet making was in decline in Kerala, with young people preferring better paying jobs than carpet weaving. The company's first supplied carpets to the Met Gala in 2022 and these drew lots of attention on social media and helped the business grow. The 2025 carpet was seen by millions on Instagram.

Neyett now has 900 employees, half of them women, at its 15-acre factory. After their carpets went viral on social media, the workers became celebrities in their communities.

Neyett carpets are luxury, costly floor coverings made from sisal fibre which is hand-dyed, spun and weaved. Sisal is strong enough to withstand the pressure of many high heels worn by Met Gala celebrities.

Other makes of sisal carpets are available from a carpet retailer in the Wrexham and Chester area at more affordable prices.