The Moroccan market where women rule

The carpet palace is at the far end of the bustling, dusty, weekly outdoor market here.

Past heaps of wheat and grain, mounds of clothes, and piles of sandals and animal feed is a rust-colored structure with vaulted archways and bushels of thread and fabric.

But visitors drawn by the allure of Berber rugs of every hue must abide by one important law: Inside this palace, women rule.

For here at Khemisset’s – literally “rug market” – women are the shearers, weavers, mediators, sellers, and distributors. There is no room for