Shangri La Museum of Islamic Art, Culture & Design

Shangri La’s collection was assembled over a period of nearly 60 years by Doris Duke (1912–1993). The first purchases were made in 1935 when Duke was 22, and the last major piece was acquired in 1992, a year before her death. Numbering approximately 4,500 objects and cultural resources, the collection includes works of art from Spain, Morocco, Egypt, Syria, Iran, Central Asia, India, and parts of Southeast Asia.  The collection is particularly strong in the later centuries of production (c. 1600–1940) and in ceramics, wood, glass, and textiles.

Many of Duke’s early purchases served a functional purpose at Shangri La: tiles for ornamenting bare walls and carpets for covering the floors. During this same period, she also acquired some of her most important pieces, including the thirteenth-century lusterware mihrab (48.327) from Veramin, Iran, one of the masterpieces of the collection.