---
title: "Jacquard"
description: "Jacquard is a patterned fabric woven on a loom fitted with a Jacquard mechanism, which lifts warp threads individually according to punched cards."
type: Glossary
url: https://teazle.art/glossary/jacquard
published: 2026-10-14
updated: 2026-10-14
author: "The Teazle editors"
---

# Jacquard

*Jacquard is a patterned fabric woven on a loom fitted with a Jacquard mechanism, which lifts warp threads individually according to punched cards.*

A jacquard fabric is one whose pattern was woven on a loom controlled by a Jacquard head. The mechanism, developed by Joseph-Marie Jacquard in early nineteenth-century France, reads a chain of punched cards and lifts each warp thread as the design demands, so a single weaver can produce complex figures that once needed a drawloom and an assistant.

## Is jacquard a weave or a machine?

Both, in everyday use. Strictly it names the mechanism; by extension it names the figured cloths it makes, including [damask](https://teazle.art/glossary/damask.md), [brocade](https://teazle.art/glossary/brocade.md) and tapestry-like fabrics. Its punched cards are often cited as a forerunner of computer programming.


## Sources

1. [Jacquard (AAT 300256616)](http://vocab.getty.edu/page/aat/300256616). Getty Art & Architecture Thesaurus
2. [Jacquard (Q78088913)](https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q78088913). Wikidata

Canonical: https://teazle.art/glossary/jacquard