Village rugs from the small town of Abadeh, which sits between Shiraz and Isfahan in Iran, recognized by hexagon shapes in the medallion, corners and field, usually with a small rosette at the center of the medallion, and by animal and plant motifs. The wool pile is typically on a cotton foundation and stands fairly high. At about 225 knots per square inch (roughly 350,000 per m²) the knot count is high for a village rug, which the detailed motifs require. Fields are usually dark navy or deep red with cream, yellow, orange, blue and green accents. The town is too small to have its own rug market, so the finished rugs are sold in the Shiraz bazaar.
Subtle shifts in color within a handmade rug, often visible as horizontal bands across the field. They arise because successive dye batches never match exactly, because differences in the wool's fat and oil content make colors change unevenly with age, and, in cream areas woven from undyed wool, because the fiber changes tone as it ages. Abrash often grows more distinct with age, so in an older rug it counts as a sign of natural dyes and hand production rather than a fault, while a newer rug is still checked for even color. Machine-made and some new hand-knotted rugs imitate it on purpose.
Village rugs woven in the Azerbaijan region of northwestern Iran, where Tabriz rugs also originate (the Iranian region, not the country of that name), traditionally by families working indoors through the cold winters. Designs pass down the generations without written blueprints, each generation adding small personal touches. A dense, durable wool pile on a cotton foundation carries mostly geometric layouts, sometimes with curvilinear florals or boteh, in vegetable-dyed navy and deep reds. Knot density is commonly quoted at about 120 to 170 KPSI (roughly 1,900 to 2,600 per 10 by 10 cm), and the thick pile suits busy areas, including runners wider than about 3 feet (90 cm).
Colorful rugs of the Bakhtiari, a Zagros Mountains tribe that was nomadic until much of it settled southwest of Isfahan in the 19th century and whose weaving now spreads across more than 200 villages; smaller pieces tend to be tribal work and larger ones come from the region's villages. The foundation is usually cotton under a wool pile from the tribe's own sheep, though some small tribal pieces are wool throughout, and every row is beaten down so hard that the pile ends up dense and long-lasting. The signature layouts are the garden panel design (Khesti, also spelled Kheshti), a grid of framed squares that each show a garden scene meant as a view of paradise, and the medallion-and-corner design with a semi-geometric center medallion. Deep red and dark navy are the usual field colors.
Tribal rugs woven by the Baluch people of the border region between northeastern Iran and Afghanistan, who sell them in the bazaar of Mashhad because they have few buyers nearby. The designs blend Turkish, Persian, and Caucasian influences and stay closest to Turkmen weaving, which came first: repeating guls (flowers set in octagons), boteh, tree-of-life motifs, and prayer designs, mostly on dark navy, red, or brown fields with ivory and dark-purple accents, though newer pieces run lighter. The thin pile is wool, usually on a wool foundation. Because the weavers move around and cannot set up large looms, rugs are small, typically 4 x 6 ft (1.2 x 1.8 m), 5 x 7 ft (1.5 x 2.1 m) or smaller, and runners reach only about 10 to 12 ft (3 to 3.7 m) long and 1.5 to 5 ft (0.46 to 1.5 m) wide.
A step of hand-knotting in which the weaver, after finishing each row of knots and weft, pounds the row down against the rows below with a beater tool to pack the pile tight. The harder a rug is beaten, the denser and longer-lasting it turns out: Bakhtiari and Bijar weavers are known for especially forceful beating, and Bijar weavers often keep the wool wet so the weft and knots can be pounded down with more force. Because a weaver's beating force also varies over time, it is one reason hand-knotted rugs are not perfectly symmetrical.
Rugs from the city of Bijar in Kurdistan province, northwestern Iran, and the villages around it; the name covers both fine and coarse double-wefted pieces, woven by Kurdish tribes and, in workshops, Afshar weavers. Nicknamed the “iron rugs” of Iran, they are among the heaviest rugs for their size: double wefts, symmetrical (Turkish) knots, and rows beaten down hard, often while the wool is kept wet, give a thick, dense pile. Designs run from floral, Herati, and medallion to geometric, drawing on Isfahan and Kashan as well as Russian, Caucasian, and European sources (a French-style rose bouquet among them), in jewel tones of rust, red, beige, and navy. Bijars are often small rugs or runners, large sizes are rare, and the flat-woven ends and fringes are typically braided.
A strip of fabric sewn along the edge of a carpet or rug to prevent fraying and give a finished look, as on area rugs and stair runners. A hand-knotted rug is normally finished differently: the weaver wraps the weft several times around the outermost warp to form the overcast, or selvage, usually a rounded, corded edge (sometimes flat, or in a contrasting wool) whose regional style helps experts tell where the rug was made.
Rugs woven today chiefly in Pakistani workshops by Pakistani and Afghan weavers who rework older Persian-Turkmen designs rooted in Central Asia; in the trade they count as Oriental rather than Persian rugs. The hallmark is an allover repeat of guls, stylized octagonal (sometimes diamond-shaped) flower motifs, on a field most often red, then cream, sometimes blue or green, and more recently black, with black, peach, blue, and green accents, all in plant-based dyes. The pile is soft, silky-looking 100 percent wool on a cotton foundation, medium in height, and some pieces come oversized; a finer grade has higher knot density, more detailed drawing, and premium Ghazni wool.
An animal fiber from camels, used less often in rugs than wool, cotton or silk and found mostly in tribal Persian rugs. Its natural warm tan tone has also become a color name: camel hair is a recurring field color in Mehraban rugs, alongside dark blue, dark red, cream and peach, so the phrase can refer to the fiber or merely to the shade.
A stage of wool preparation that follows scouring and precedes carding, in which the fibers are softened and whitened. It is one of the washing steps that turn freshly shorn fleece into clean wool ready to be carded, spun and dyed into rug yarn.
A wool-preparation step in which cleaned wool passes through a carding machine that lines the fibers up in one direction and removes any impurities still left. It follows scouring and carbonizing and comes before spinning, leaving the wool ready to be spun into yarn for the rug.
A Persian rug made in a city, often inside a workshop, one of the three families (city, village, tribal) into which Persian rugs are commonly sorted. Weavers usually follow a designer's drawn plan under experienced or master weavers, and a workshop can buy wool in bulk and color it all at once, so standards are stricter than in memory-based village and tribal weaving. City rugs generally reach the highest knot densities and the widest range of sizes, colors and designs, most often florals (Tabriz, Kashan, Isfahan, Kerman, Nain, Mashhad, Sarouk). Workshop origin usually signals higher quality, but not every workshop rug is signed.
The dyed variety of Gabbeh, the thick-piled, simply drawn tribal rug of Fars province. Because the weavers dye the wool, any palette is possible, from reds, blues and greens to yellows, and the strong colors usually go with bold, abstract designs of trees, animals and people. The counterpart is natural Gabbeh, woven from undyed white and black wool in cream, brown, gray and black tones.
Low-grade wool taken from dead sheep rather than shorn from living ones; in the wool trade it is usually pulled from the hides of slaughtered animals. The fiber is thin and dry, so it ends up mainly in cheaper, poorer-quality rugs and counts as a mark of low quality. Its opposite is wool shorn in spring, especially from sheep raised at high elevation, which is thicker and oilier.
A type of carpet made by compressing and matting wool fibers together using heat, moisture, and pressure rather than weaving or tufting. The resulting material is dense, durable, and naturally water-resistant. Modern felted wool carpets combine traditional techniques with contemporary designs for a unique textile that provides excellent thermal and acoustic insulation.
Antique Persian carpets from the Ferahan (also spelled Farahan or Feraghan) plain in central Iran, known for all-over Herati patterns and subtle color palettes. These 19th-century rugs typically feature a diamond lattice of small floral motifs, often in navy blue, rust red and ivory, and are prized for their fine weave and balanced, restrained compositions. In today's trade the name is also used for newly made Pakistani workshop rugs of the Peshawar (Chobi) type, woven from hand-spun wool and vegetable dyes in subdued colors and mostly Persian-inspired all-over designs, and sometimes for Sarouk rugs from the same region; such rugs are not antique Ferahan carpets.
A traditional handmade Greek rug characterized by its long, shaggy pile made from 100% wool. Authentic Flokati rugs are woven in Greece, then washed in the cold waters of the Pindus mountains, causing the wool to fluff and create their distinctive fluffy texture. Originally used by shepherds for warmth, they are now popular decorative pieces known for their luxurious softness and natural cream color.
The warp ends that extend past both short ends of a rug. In a hand-knotted rug the fringe is not a trim added at the end but the visible continuation of the foundation, whose warp threads can be followed through the whole rug on its back, so it is made of the same fiber (cotton, wool or silk) and shows what the foundation is made of. It should not be cut off; if it has to be hidden, it can be tied back against the reverse. Weavers cut, tie, braid or decorate it, with braided or decorated ends especially common in tribal and village rugs, and how it is finished helps identify the origin; it is also seldom perfectly even, one end often running longer than the other. A fringe attached afterward, or none at all, points toward a machine-made rug.
A rug from Fars province in Iran, first documented in the 1600s, about 400 years ago, and woven by the region's tribes and settled villagers on a wool or goat-hair foundation (rarely cotton), with a long, thick, dense wool pile that is not clipped short. Its low knot density gives simple, bold designs in which trees, animals, and people become abstract geometric shapes. Color Gabbeh is dyed in any hue, often strongly, while natural Gabbeh uses undyed white and black wool in cream, brown, gray, and black tones, usually on a cream ground. Typical sizes are about 3-4 by 6-7 ft (0.9-1.2 by 1.8-2.1 m). Finer city-woven versions come from Shiraz, and very fine, heavy pieces are sometimes called Qashqai, though they are not true Qashqai rugs.
A prized rug wool from the Ghazni region of Afghanistan. Like other top-grade fleece it is thick and oily, and it is ranked with Manchester wool and New Zealand wool among the three best-known high-quality wools for Persian and Oriental rugs. Kazak rugs woven by Afghan weavers in Pakistan use it hand-spun.
An animal fiber that tribal weavers sometimes use for a rug's foundation in place of wool, as in Gabbeh and Quchan rugs, while the pile itself stays wool. Together with mohair, camel hair and cow hair it is among the less common rug materials, seen mostly in tribal work, and it also turns up in some flat-woven kilims.
Rugs from the city of Hamadan in western Iran, a long-established weaving region, and from the more than 1,500 villages around it, which together produce thousands of designs. Village pieces, often woven by families at home in winter, are usually smaller rugs or runners (some longer than 20 ft, about 6 m) in geometric, hexagonal- or diamond-medallion, or Herati designs in red, deep blue, and cream, tied with the symmetrical Turkish knot at a density that is usually low to medium. City workshop pieces are more floral and more finely knotted. The pile is wool on a cotton foundation (wool in some older rugs), and the single-weft construction standard around Hamadan tends to give a soft pile thinner than in double-wefted rugs.
A rug construction in which the weaver ties each knot of wool or silk pile yarn by hand around adjacent warp threads on a loom, then runs a weft through the row and beats it down. The cut knot ends form the pile, the warps and wefts form the foundation, and the warp ends become the fringe. A rug can take months or even years, and the work leaves subtle irregularities: patterns not perfectly symmetrical, opposite edges a few inches different in length, an uneven fringe. Authentic Persian, Oriental and Turkish rugs are hand-knotted, unlike hand-tufted rugs (sometimes sold as “handmade”) and machine-made ones, whose backs feel stiff and evenly aligned.
Wool yarn spun from cleaned, carded fleece by hand or on a manual wheel rather than by machine, after which the spun threads are twisted together into thicker, stronger strands before dyeing. It gives finer, softer threads than machine spinning, so the wool feels softer and looks shinier, and hand spinning is said to preserve the wool's natural lanolin. It is usual in Kazak and Peshawar rugs woven in Pakistan and in Afghan Khal Mohammadi rugs, all of which are also colored with natural dyes.
The rust red for which Heriz rugs are best known, usually set with dark navy and cream in the field and border. According to local tradition, the weavers keep the dyed wool for a while in a river of the Heriz area that carries copper minerals, and the copper shifts the dye to this rustic tone, which is why the color is tied so closely to Heriz.
Bold village rugs from the Heriz area of northwestern Iran, near Tabriz, and the best-known of all Persian village rugs. A coarse, tough wool pile on a cotton foundation, usually double-wefted for extra thickness, and a low-to-medium knot density (commonly quoted at about 120 to 170 KPSI, roughly 1,900 to 2,600 per 10 by 10 cm) make them very durable; the wool's strength is traditionally credited to copper-bearing mountain water. The classic design is a large angular medallion with four corner pieces, sometimes an allover layout, in a rust red traditionally credited to copper minerals in the local river, with dark navy and cream. Bakshaish and Serapi, the latter now over a century old, are their older forms.
Weakening of a rug's pile and foundation caused by prolonged exposure to high humidity or damp conditions. Moisture working into the natural fibers leaves them frail and can eventually make them decay, and the same dampness attracts moths and other pests. Damp, hot or poorly ventilated storage, bathrooms and humid climates are the usual settings; remedies are a dehumidifier, good airflow, a rug pad that blocks moisture rising from the floor, a lower pile that absorbs less humidity, and airing the rug outdoors in the sun for a few hours once or twice a year, without leaving its face in strong sun for long. Humidity swings also make a wool foundation stretch and shrink and distort the rug, whereas a cotton foundation holds its size better.
A deep blue natural dye, traditionally obtained from Indigofera plants and named alongside madder root and walnut husks among the plant dyes that color the wool of natural-dye rugs. It provides the deep midnight blues of rugs such as Heriz and Bakhtiari, and the dyed yarn reveals its full blue only as the dye oxidizes in air. In rug descriptions the word also names that deep blue shade itself.
A very large government-owned Iranian rug producer, known by the initials ICC and in the United States as the Iranian Rug Company, whose roots reach back to 1934. It runs a network of workshops in about 44 cities, including Tabriz, Hamadan and Sarouk, with some 25,000 workers, and turns out roughly 50,000 square meters (about 540,000 square feet) of rugs a year. It supplies wool and materials and lends money for replacing old looms. Dyeing and weaving are tightly controlled, and even a small flaw has to be unpicked and redone, so its signature signals consistent, high quality whichever town the rug comes from.
Persian city rugs from Isfahan in central Iran, among the most finely knotted anywhere: usually 500-700 KPSI (roughly 7,750-10,850 knots per 10 x 10 cm), second only to Qum. Most are woven in fine kork wool from young sheep; some have a silk-and-wool pile on a silk or cotton foundation, and a few are reportedly pure silk. Designs draw on nature and the city's architecture, from medallion-and-corner and floral allover layouts to hunting scenes, trees of life, prayer niches and pictorial gardens, usually in soft pastels with indigo and bright red on an ivory ground. Most pieces are signed, and large sizes are scarce and costly.
Handcrafted carpets from Jaipur, India, known for their vibrant colors and intricate designs. Traditional Jaipuri rugs feature distinctive floral patterns, geometric motifs, and sometimes incorporate block-printing techniques. These rugs often use a cotton foundation with wool pile and are renowned for their craftsmanship, with techniques passed down through generations of artisans in Rajasthan.
Village rugs from a group of villages in the Azerbaijan region of Iran, at the western edge of the Heriz weaving area and named for the village of Karaja at their center. Wool pile on a cotton foundation (very old pieces may have a wool one), Turkish knot and single weft, so the pile is thinner and softer than the usually double-wefted Heriz, and knot density is low to medium. Two bold geometric medallions with hook-like edges typically alternate down a runner, often on a different ground color with each repeat, and on wide rugs the repeated medallions read as a geometric allover, in orange-reds, blues, creams and browns. Their soft, thin pile and great lengths, some over 20 feet (6 m), make them popular as hallway and stair runners.
Wool from the Karakul sheep, the breed of the region where the Turkoman (Turkmen) nomads live. The fleece has two layers, a thicker, coarser outer coat and a softer, finer inner coat, and Turkoman rugs are made from the softer inner layer.
Fine Persian carpets from the city of Kashan in central Iran, a weaving center since the 17th-century Safavid era, when the rulers holidayed there and furnished their villas with local rugs. The pile is typically all wool, often imported Manchester wool, of medium height on a cotton foundation; silk-and-wool pieces are mostly older. Designs are formal and vary little: a central medallion, a medallion with matching corner pieces or allover florals, plus a rare design called Darbari, reportedly with little or no border. Rugs of about 5 by 7 feet (1.5 by 2.1 m) and smaller show more variety, such as tree of life, vase and bird patterns. Classic colors are deep red, navy and cream; yellow or green fields are rare, and newer rugs are softer pastels.
Rugs from Kashmar, a city in northeastern Iran near Mashhad, whose weavers bring finished pieces to the Mashhad market. Less famous than Tabriz, Mashhad or Kashan, they are often undervalued relative to their quality: good wool, often high knot density and vegetable dyes at a modest price. The colors are soft earth tones: brownish cream, light and dark blue, orange, brown and a distinctive pink. Typical designs are a medallion with corner pieces and border, sometimes with vases in place of flowers, and garden designs in panels that each show a scene, such as a lake with trees, a tree of life or deer in a forest. The pile is thin to medium. Not to be confused with Kashmir.
The most expensive of the three grades of modern Kazak rugs that Afghan weavers make in Pakistan, above commercial and Super Kazak. Its knot density equals that of a commercial Kazak or runs slightly higher, but it offers a much wider range of patterns and harmonious colors, with designs inspired by Persian Heriz rugs, and a medium-to-thick pile that feels more luxurious. Its hand-spun wool is the best of the three grades, thick and rich, and its colors come from vegetable dyes. Although the rugs look antique, they are newly made.
Bold geometric rugs originally woven by Armenian weavers in the southern Caucasus in the 1800s, in what is now Armenia, Georgia, and Azerbaijan, with large-scale patterns, tribal motifs and many medallions. Today they come mainly from workshops in Pakistan, where Afghan weavers have recreated the designs since the 1980s and 1990s in hand-spun Ghazni wool and vegetable dyes, in softer modern colors such as beige, teal, indigo, and rust red, often with a red field against a cream medallion and border; India also makes Kazak-style rugs. The low-to-medium pile is cut short and stone-washed for an antique look. Grades are commercial (lowest knot density), Super (finest knotting, silky wool), and Kazak Azari (Heriz-inspired designs, thicker pile, best wool, highest price); examples measure about 121 KPSI (roughly 1,900 knots per 10 x 10 cm) to 169 KPSI (roughly 2,600).
Fine Persian carpets from Kerman in southern Iran, a city on the old Iran-India trade route and one of the historic rug-weaving centers, famed for its master dyers. Designs vary widely: florals and allovers, tree of life, hunting, garden and open-field layouts, fine “spring” florals of tiny flowers, and the distinctive “vase” technique. The pile is usually soft kork wool on a cotton foundation, sometimes silk-and-wool or pure silk. One rug can hold 15 to 30 colors, mostly deep reds, several blues, green and cream, with pastels such as champagne, lime green, pink and gray-blue in newer pieces. Roughly half of Kerman rugs, from lesser workshops, use the jufti knot, a shortcut yielding a sparser, lower-quality weave.
Rugs of Afghan origin and design, named, unusually, after a person rather than a place: according to trade legend, a master rug maker and dyer who stayed in northern Afghanistan during the Russian invasion and began producing them there. They are known for deep, naturally dyed reds and blues with orange, black and rust accents, and for geometric layouts with fine floral details inspired by Bokhara and Turkoman designs; slight shade variation is normal in natural dye. The pile is 100 percent wool from mountain sheep whose fatty wool has a soft sheen, on a cotton foundation, at a medium height. Some are classed as Pakistan-made. A finer, denser grade, often labeled Belgique, draws the same design more sharply.
A flat-woven rug with no pile, traditionally made in Turkey, Iran, Afghanistan, and the Balkans. Colored weft threads are interlaced with the warp without knots, so both sides look alike. The fibers are typically wool, cotton, or goat hair, and natural dyes often give slight shade variations that are normal, not flaws. Its low profile clears doors easily, and it can hang as wall art. In a knotted rug, "kilim" also names the flat-woven band at each end, where extra weft rows secure the ends beside the fringe.
A fine, soft grade of wool taken from the neck and inner fleece layer of young sheep, often from the first shearing. Oily with natural lanolin, it feels soft and resilient and gives colors extra shine. It is used for the pile of many fine city rugs from Isfahan, Kerman, Qum, Tabriz, and Mashad, and older antique Sarouks cut to a short pile use it too. Also spelled cork or kurk wool.
The natural wax that coats wool fibers and serves as the fleece’s own protection, waterproofing it. Wool from sheep raised at higher elevations is thicker and oilier ("fatty"), and a warm, slightly oily hand is a quick sign of real wool. In a carpet, the lanolin that remains repels liquids, so spills bead on the surface for a few moments instead of soaking in, one reason wool resists spills and soil. Hand spinning preserves it, while repeated harsh chemical cleaning strips it away, so gentle washing is recommended.
Wool yarn spun by mechanical equipment rather than by hand or on a manual wheel, the counterpart of hand-spun wool. Machine-made rugs are built on machine-spun or synthetic yarns, and in judging wool quality machine-spun ranks below hand-spun, which yields finer, softer threads with more sheen. Spinning is only one factor in wool quality; the sheep's grazing, the elevation they live at and the season of shearing count as well.
The root of the madder plant (Rubia tinctorum), a natural red dye and the source of the terracotta tones in Persian and Oriental rugs. Together with indigo and walnut husks it is among the plant dyes used to color the wool, bonding to its natural lanolin. Slight shade variations within one color area, known as abrash, are normal in rugs dyed this way.
Village rugs from the town of Malayer and neighboring villages between Arak and Hamadan, usually dated to about the 19th century and woven on an old trade route that brought in outside designs. A cotton foundation, wool pile and symmetrical Turkish knot give a finer weave than most village rugs, with the pile clipped fairly low to show detail. Diamond or hexagonal medallions, small white dots in the border ringing the medallion and a rope-like loop effect in the rug's own border are typical marks. The south-eastern, Sarouk-like style is double-wefted and thicker, with floral medallions or Tree of Life designs; the north-western, Hamadan-like style is single-wefted, geometric and lighter in color. Small rugs and runners predominate, mostly on navy, deep red or cream grounds.
A high-grade wool imported from Manchester, England, that Kashan weavers typically use for the pile of their rugs. It is ranked with Ghazni wool and New Zealand wool among the three best-known high-quality wools for Persian rugs, so where a rug's wool comes from is one of the quality points that can be checked.
Persian city rugs from Mashhad, Iran's second-largest city, in the north-east, where weaving began in the late Middle Ages. They are known for high knot density (typically above 250 KPSI, roughly 39 per cm², and exceptionally near 1,000, about 155 per cm², on a silk foundation) and intricate flower designs in medallion, medallion-and-corner or allover layouts, in wine-red or burgundy, deep blue, green and cream. The pile is wool on a cotton foundation and higher than in most city rugs; a silk foundation is rare, and newer silk-and-wool pieces add silk to the pile. Rugs of the closed Saber workshop are now collectible, while Astan Quds Razavi remains a well-known name.
Village rugs from the Mehraban district, a cluster of villages in the north of the Hamadan region beside Kurdish Iran, so Kurdish styles appear. They are single-wefted rugs on cotton, knotted with the symmetrical (Turkish) knot, with a medium pile of fine, soft, lustrous, oily wool, on dark blue, dark red, cream, camel-hair or peach fields. Older pieces are geometric, with repeating medallions and bird or animal motifs, largely made for the weavers' own use; newer ones follow American Sarouk florals. The district is known for runners, typically 2.5 to 3 ft (76-91 cm) wide and 6 to 20 ft (1.8-6.1 m) long. It is not the Meraban of East Azerbaijan, which weaves Heriz-style rugs.
The long, silky, lustrous hair of the Angora goat. In Persian rugs it is one of several animal fibers, listed together with goat hair, camel hair and cow hair, that can serve as a material but are much less common than the usual wool, cotton and silk; this group is seen mostly in tribal rugs.
Protection of carpets from moths and other pests that eat away natural fibers such as wool and silk, leaving holes and spots that look eaten away, even on newer rugs. Treatment of the fibers is one measure, and mothballs are sometimes used for storage longer than about a year or in moth-prone places, though they leave a lingering odor. The main defense is upkeep: moths favor dark, damp, undisturbed places such as beneath sofas or in storage, so a clean, dry, ventilated rug that is vacuumed under furniture and shaken out and aired every few months is far less likely to be attacked. A rug going into storage is cleaned first and wrapped in breathable material, then unwrapped and checked about every six months if it stays a year or more.
Rugs of eastern Iran that the trade sells under the name Moud Mashad, listing them with Mashhad rugs. They usually carry a Herati design in beige, blue, rust and red and are typically signed by their maker. The foundation is cotton; older pieces have a plain wool pile, while newer ones use a silk-and-wool pile.
Fine Persian rugs from the city of Nain, near Isfahan in central Iran, where rug weaving began only in the 20th century on Isfahan's model and the Habibian workshop made the name known worldwide. The wool pile, often with silk highlights, is knotted on a cotton foundation at roughly 200 to 700 knots per square inch or more (about 31 to 108 per cm²). Density is graded by la (“layer”): the lower the number, the finer the rug, from about 650 KPSI at 4 la to 400-500 at 6 la and 200-300 at 9 la. Designs are curvilinear florals in medallion, allover or Shah Abbasi layouts, mostly on a cream or ivory ground with blue, beige and gray. Most Nain rugs are unsigned, though the Habibian signature is a well-known exception, and large sizes are scarce and costly.
Colorants extracted from plants, seeds, flowers and roots and, in some traditions, from animal sources, used to color rug wool and silk. Weavers, above all tribal weavers, often prepare them from local plants and other natural resources of the region, which helps give each region its characteristic tones; madder root (terracotta reds), indigo (blues), walnut husks (browns) and pomegranate rind (yellows) are typical dyestuffs. Because dye is made in small artisanal batches, shades differ slightly from batch to batch, producing abrash. Natural dyes are prized for rich, harmonious, mellow color that fades gently and evenly with age and bleeds little on a damp cloth, though a rug may combine mostly natural dyes with a few synthetic ones.
Wool sourced from New Zealand, ranked with Manchester and Ghazni wool among the three best-known high-quality wools for Persian and Oriental rugs; good rug wool of this kind feels thick and oily. Because it is imported rather than taken from local flocks, its use affects a rug's price. It is cited for the pile of Pakistan-woven Oushak, Ziegler and Peshawar rugs, sometimes paired with Ghazni wool, and for the thick pile of Kazak Azari rugs.
Carpets woven by nomadic tribes across the Middle East, Central Asia, and North Africa, who move with their flocks through spring, summer and fall and settle in winter to weave. Working on compact portable looms, they typically make small pieces (for example 4 x 6 or 5 x 7 ft, about 1.2 x 1.8 or 1.5 x 2.1 m), sometimes runners, using wool from their own flocks, often for both foundation and pile, traditionally dyed with local plants. The bold, mostly geometric designs are passed down through generations without written patterns and sometimes echo city rugs. Unlike city or workshop rugs, they often show asymmetry, color variation and patterns that do not resolve neatly at the corners.
A layout in which most of the field is left open, usually one plain ground color with only a few flowers in curving lines and sometimes a medallion. It comes in three forms: a single central medallion, two or more repeating medallions, or an allover scatter of motifs with generous space between them. The composition is said to echo the cover of a Quran and is found mainly in city-style Persian rugs such as Tabriz, Kashan, Sarouk, Hamadan, and Kerman, and also in Bijar rugs. With so little pattern to hide behind, inconsistencies in the wool or dyeing show plainly.
A rug in the classic style of Ushak (Uşak), a Turkish weaving city with a long tradition of classical designs. Rugs sold under the name today are commonly hand-knotted in Pakistan, in workshops set up in the 1970s, in the trade account, by owners who left Iran after an embargo. They reproduce Turkish and old Persian patterns, mostly soft floral all-over or medallion layouts with little geometric drawing, in wool from Ghazni and New Zealand on a cotton foundation. Vegetable dyes, an antique wash, several shades of one color and a short, low pile give a muted, aged look, while designers choose palettes that follow color trends. Depending on design and knot density, the same family is also sold as Peshawar, Chobi, Ziegler or Ferahan.
The soft, mellowed look a rug's natural dyes acquire over decades of use and light, as the colors settle into subtler, more harmonious tones that mellow rather than merely fade; the wool also grows softer and loose fibers wear away, so the pattern reads more sharply. It is fullest in antique rugs and is treated as a mark of genuine age. Artificial aging treatments imitate it but tend to give a bleached look with an abrupt band of color in the fiber instead of a gradual fade from tip to base.
A hand-knotted rug woven in Iran, the country called Persia in the West until 1935, in a tradition said to reach back some 2,500 years. It is named after the city, town, region or tribe where it was made (Tabriz, Kashan, Heriz, Baluchi) and belongs to one of three groups: city rugs woven in workshops from a blueprint, village rugs, and tribal rugs, the latter two woven largely from memory. The pile is wool, silk or a blend, on a cotton, wool or silk foundation. Look-alikes woven in Pakistan, India or China are not Persian rugs.
Hand-knotted rugs from Pakistan, made in the city of Peshawar in the north of the country and also called Chobi. They copy old Persian and Turkish designs, mostly floral all-over or repeating patterns (medallions are rare, because all-over layouts suit more rooms), using hand-spun wool and vegetable dyes. The rugs are woven in darker tones, then stone-washed and left in strong sunlight, and the pile is cut short so the pattern shows, which gives a new rug an antique finish. Colors are soft and subdued, often beige-based, with deliberate light-and-dark variation that imitates aged rugs; the rugs feel thin yet wear well. The same look is also sold as Oushak, Ziegler or Ferahan.
The surface of a rug or carpet, made of upright fibers in cut tufts or loops. In a hand-knotted rug it is formed by the cut ends of thousands of wool or silk knots tied onto the warp row by row, trimmed lightly during weaving and given its final height by shearing at finishing. Pile thickness, measured from the back of the rug to the top of the pile, typically runs from low, about 1/8 to 1/4 inch (3 to 6 mm), to high, about 1/2 to 5/8 inch (13 to 16 mm). Fine, dense designs are cut short to keep the pattern sharp; higher pile suits traffic and heavy furniture, lower pile suits door clearance and humid rooms.
The height of a rug's knotted pile, measured from the back of the rug to the top of the pile with a ruler or caliper, so the foundation is included. One dealer scheme sorts it into low (1/8 to 1/4 in, or 3.2 to 6.4 mm), low-medium (1/4 to 1/3 in, or 6.4 to 8.5 mm), medium (1/3 to 3/8 in, or 8.5 to 9.5 mm) and high (1/2 to 5/8 in, or 12.7 to 15.9 mm). The final trim sets it: sharply detailed, densely knotted rugs, including silk and silk-and-wool pieces, are cut low, while coarse ones with large designs, such as Heriz and Gabbeh, keep a taller pile. A higher pile feels more cushioned, and a medium-to-high pile suits busy areas and heavy furniture; a lower pile clears doors, absorbs less humidity, traps less dust and vacuums more easily.
The cutting back of a rug's knotted pile with shears. Weavers trim it lightly every few inches (roughly every 5 to 10 cm) of knotting so the pattern stays visible, and a final trim after the rug comes off the loom sets the finished pile height. Finely knotted rugs, such as silk Tabriz and other silk and silk-and-wool pieces, are cut short so that sharp detail shows, while rugs made to look antique, such as Kazak and Oushak-style pieces, are deliberately cut short so they feel thin and look aged.
A rug whose pile is entirely silk, woven on a cotton foundation or on a silk foundation; when both are silk, no wool enters the rug. Silk's fineness allows the highest knot density of any Persian rug, roughly 600 to 1,000 knots per square inch (about 9,300 to 15,500 per 10 x 10 cm), so the pile is kept low to show the design, and the fibers give a luminous sheen that shifts with the light. About 90 percent of Qum rugs are silk on both foundation and pile, as are some Isfahan rugs. These are the most expensive Persian rugs; they are delicate and stains are hard to remove, so they suit display, formal rooms or wall hanging rather than dining rooms or homes with pets.
Tribal rugs woven by the Qashqai, a nomadic tribe of southwestern Iran that unites Turkic, Arab, Kurdish and Lur groups and has lived in the region since at least the 16th century. Designs come from memory rather than written plans, pairing geometric and medallion layouts, occasionally in a simpler, sparsely detailed form, with animals, plants and household objects, in jewel-tone reds, saffron gold and indigo, often on deep red or dark navy grounds. The thick, hard-weaving wool of the tribe's own flocks is durable yet soft, forming a medium-height, dense pile on a cotton or wool foundation that suits busy areas; compact looms keep sizes small, typically 4 x 6 ft (1.2 x 1.8 m) or 5 x 7 ft (1.5 x 2.1 m) plus runners.
Tribal rugs woven by Kurdish weavers around Quchan, north of Mashhad in northeastern Iran, a border region where the Safavid rulers settled Kurdish tribes to help guard the frontier. A wool or goat-hair foundation carries a wool pile at about 120 knots per square inch (roughly 186,000 per square meter), high for tribal work. Geometric medallion or all-over designs in strong red, blue or ivory fields resemble Caucasian rugs and, above all, Anatolian ones, since the weavers' ancestors came from Anatolia. Compact looms keep sizes small to medium, seldom wider than 6 ft (1.8 m) or longer than 13 ft (4 m).
Persian rugs from the city of Qum (Qom), a comparatively young weaving center whose rugs are known for the highest knot density of any Persian type. About nine in ten are pure silk on a silk foundation, at roughly 600 to 1,000 knots per square inch (KPSI; about 93 to 155 per cm²); the rest, with kork wool or silk-and-wool piles, run about 300 to 700 KPSI (about 47 to 108 per cm²). Designs are floral medallions, hunting scenes and pictorials, mostly in soft pastel, ivory, gold and green tones (a pistachio-green field is prized) on light or dark grounds. Newer rugs usually carry a workshop signature, older ones often do not. The local water is said to soften and brighten silk, so silk rugs from across Iran are sent there for washing.
The practice of estimating how old a handmade rug is by weighing several clues together, since no single one settles it. Experts look at wear, the polish of the back, how the dye fades from tip to base, the foundation (rugs woven after the 1930s usually have cotton rather than wool), whether the design fits a particular era or a stage in its locale's style over about 150 years, and whether a supposedly very old rug shows any repairs. Old patterns are copied today, so design alone is not enough.
The skeleton of a hand-knotted rug: the warp and weft threads on which every pile knot is tied. Cotton is the usual material in city and village rugs because it barely stretches or shrinks with humidity, so the rug keeps its shape, and it is rigid enough to knot through easily; that same rigidity can carry over into the design, which reads as less fluid than on a wool foundation. Wool, and sometimes goat hair, is typical of tribal rugs, whose weavers can use one material for both foundation and pile; it gives more character but a less straight shape. Silk, being finer, permits very high knot counts. The fringes at each end are the foundation's exposed warp ends, so they reveal its material.
A weaving workshop in Mashhad (Mashad), northeastern Iran, founded around the mid-twentieth century by Abbas Gholi Saber and known for large, high-end rugs of typically about 12 square meters (roughly 129 square feet, or 10 by 13 feet) and up, made on about sixty looms at its peak. Some pieces use a silk foundation, very uncommon among Mashhad rugs, which are usually woven wool on cotton; one such piece is said to reach nearly 1,000 knots per square inch (about 155 per square centimeter). After the founder's death his longtime foreman reportedly kept up the same quality but stopped adding the Saber signature, so signed Saber rugs are rare, collectible and bring higher prices.
Popular, durable Persian city rugs from Sarouk, a town in central Iran about 50 km (31 miles) north of Arak, prominent from the 19th century and exported to Europe and America. A cotton foundation carries a medium-to-thick wool pile, at times with silk highlights, usually tied with the Persian knot (some older pieces use the Turkish knot) at medium-to-high density of up to about 320 knots per square inch (roughly 50 per cm²). Floral, medallion and allover designs, with some Herati, boteh and pictorial patterns, appear on beige, ivory, cream, navy or red fields, the red leaning toward orange or rust, usually with a thin secondary border. American Sarouks, woven mainly in the 1920s and 1930s, adapted designs and colors to U.S. taste, and many were re-dyed to a preferred rose red.
The first washing of raw wool after shearing, in which dirt and other impurities are removed from the fleece. It is one of the opening processes in preparing wool for Persian and Oriental rugs and is followed by carbonizing, carding and spinning into yarn.
The Isfahan workshop founded in 1940 by Haj Agha Reza Seirafian, a banker who had long traded and produced carpets, and carried on by his family through several generations. It is widely regarded as the best-known name in fine Isfahan rugs, which are densely knotted in fine wool, sometimes with silk, in floral and medallion designs. As in other elite city workshops, the master's name is woven into a border or a small cartouche, which ties the rug to the workshop's strict standards and makes signed pieces sought after by collectors.
The woven-in side edge of a hand-knotted rug, made during weaving as the weft is wrapped several times around the outermost warp to form a rounded, corded band. Depending on the region, the wrapping may use wool of a contrasting color, use the warp itself, or be kept flat rather than round, so the edge is one clue experts use to place a rug's origin. The word overcasting names this same edge and also appears in lists of common rug repairs.
Finely woven small-to-medium rugs and runners from the Kurdish weaving villages around Senneh (modern Sanandaj) in western Iran, known for meticulous, thin, tight single-weft construction on a cotton foundation with a wool pile. Designs are mostly geometric medallions and allover patterns, with boteh and Herati also woven, in dark red, navy, and brown, sometimes beige, with yellow, red, light green, orange, and white accents. The city gives its name to the “Senneh knot”, another name for the asymmetrical Persian knot, yet its weavers actually use the symmetrical Turkish knot.
The clipping of the fleece from a living sheep with specialized shearing tools, the first step in making a wool rug. It is traditionally done in spring, when the wool is considered best for rugs, and the first or second shearing of the season yields wool with the most natural fat. Wool taken from dead sheep is thin and dry and turns up in cheaper, poorer-quality rugs.
Rugs woven by local tribes in and around Shiraz in Fars province, southwestern Iran, in their own homes and sold at the local bazaar. Weavers settling in the area bring their home regions' patterns, giving a hybrid of Abadeh and Qashqai styles: geometric single or repeating medallions or all-over layouts, sometimes with boteh, in strong reds and browns lifted by cream, yellow, blue and green. The wool pile sits on a cotton foundation, which packs tighter, or a wool one, which is looser; density is low to medium, about 120 knots per square inch (roughly 186,000 per square meter).
A rug whose pile combines silk and wool, usually mostly wool with silk yarn knotted into chosen details such as floral motifs to add sheen and sharpen the pattern. Silk is finer than wool and permits denser knotting, roughly 400 to 700 knots per square inch (about 6,200 to 10,850 per 10 x 10 cm) on a cotton foundation and 500 to 1,000 (about 7,750 to 15,500) on a silk foundation, although Nain, almost always on cotton, drops lower in its coarser la grades, where a higher la number means fewer knots. The wool keeps the pile thick and durable and the price below that of pure silk, though above that of wool alone. Tabriz, Nain, Mashad, Bijar, Isfahan and Qum all weave these rugs, usually with the pile cut short to show the detail.
A rug base in which the warp and weft threads are silk rather than the usual cotton or wool. Silk is finer and thinner, so many more knots fit into each square inch; silk-based rugs typically run about 500 to 1,000 knots per square inch (roughly 78 to 155 per square centimeter). It is found mainly in fine traditional city rugs, most commonly Qum and Isfahan, and also in select Tabriz workshops and a special group of Yomut Turkoman rugs. The pile above may be wool, silk and wool, or pure silk.
Silk yarn knotted into selected parts of an otherwise wool pile, such as flowers, animals and other pattern details, so those areas shimmer against the wool and the design gains vibrancy and depth. Because silk is finer than wool, it also permits a higher knot density. The device is a hallmark of Nain rugs, where blue or ivory silk picks out different areas of the design, and it is common in Tabriz and some Sarouk rugs. Stains are harder to remove from silk than from wool, so a pile of pure wool is the better choice for a dining room.
The degree to which a hand-knotted rug holds true, parallel edges and a width that stays nearly the same at the top, middle and bottom. A machine-made rug almost always measures identical at every point, but a handmade one never does exactly, because wooden looms expand and contract over time, and wool foundations, which also react to humidity, do so more than cotton ones; village and tribal weavings are especially prone to being crooked. A difference of an inch or two (2.5 to 5 cm) is acceptable, while major differences count as a flaw that lowers quality and value. It is checked by eye from a distance, against the lines of a hard floor, or by measuring the top, middle and bottom with a tape.
The lightening of a rug's colors after long exposure to direct sunlight, most noticeable when one part of the rug sat in a sunny window patch while the rest stayed in shade, leaving that area visibly paler. Natural dyes soften with age in any case, but patchy fading counts as a condition flaw and is not the same as abrash, the gentle color variation that comes from dye batches and wool. Curtains or blinds at peak hours, UV-filtering film, a piece of fabric laid over an exposed patch and occasional rotation of the rug limit it; a rug sunned outdoors to dry should not have its face left long in strong sun.
The grade of modern hand-knotted Kazak rugs with the highest knot density, woven in Pakistan by Afghan weavers. The tighter weave allows finer, more detailed geometric patterns, and the high-quality wool has an almost silky look and a soft sheen, in a good range of colors. It is priced in the middle of the three grades: the standard (commercial) Kazak, with the lowest density and large, bold patterns, costs less, and the Kazak Azari, with a wider range of designs and colors and thicker wool, costs more.
Rugs from Tabriz, the large northwestern Iranian city and former Safavid capital, and its surrounding villages, where weaving is traced back at least to the 1500s. Weavers use the Turkish knot and small metal hooks, which give very regular, symmetrical patterns, usually on a cotton foundation (silk for the finest pieces), often double-wefted, with a short-clipped to medium pile. Densities run from about 50 to 500 knots per square inch (roughly 8 to 78 per cm²), silk-foundation pieces can exceed 600, and silk highlights lend vibrancy to floral designs. Some workshops weave only silk-and-wool rugs, favoring pastels. Tabriz offers the widest range of designs and colors of any Persian source: medallion, floral, Herati, hunting and vase patterns, plus most pictorial portraits. A rug sold as “Tabriz-style” is not necessarily woven in Tabriz.
Rugs woven by mostly nomadic tribes, chiefly in Iran but also across the Middle East, Central Asia, and North Africa; a few names, such as Bakhtiari and Gabbeh, span tribal and village weaving. The tribes move with their flocks from spring to fall and typically settle in winter to weave on compact, portable looms, so rugs are small, often 4 x 6 ft (1.2 x 1.8 m) or 5 x 7 ft (1.5 x 2.1 m), or runners, and oversized pieces are rarely found. Wool from the tribe's own flocks often serves for both foundation and pile (goat hair is also used), dyed with local plants. Designs, mostly geometric, are passed down and woven from memory rather than from a drawing, so unlike city rugs the pattern often fails to resolve neatly at the corners. Qashqai, Baluchi, and Turkoman rugs are named after their tribes.
Tribal rugs woven by Turkoman (Turkmen) nomads, whose forebears came from the Afghan and Uzbek region and who later settled in the Turkmen region of Iran. Rows of octagonal guls (“flowers”) cover a deep red, reddish-brown or occasionally cream field, accented in black, blue, green or beige; prayer designs also occur. Foundation and pile are usually wool, said to come from the soft undercoat of Karakul sheep, though a cotton foundation is occasionally used. In older pieces each tribe kept its own gul design, whereas newer rugs freely mix them. Turkoman designs inspired Bokhara and Khal Mohammadi rugs and are the Persian design closest to Baluchi work, which they predate; the low-to-medium pile suits places where doors swing over the rug.
Wool left in its natural fleece colors, with no dye applied, so its shades run only through white, cream, brown, gray and black. Weavers combine white and black wool to reach these tones, which is how natural Gabbeh rugs, usually on a cream ground, get their palette. Many cream grounds in Persian and Oriental rugs also contain undyed wool; these areas can show slight variations of tone that shift as the rug ages, which is normal and not a defect.
A semi-synthetic fiber made from cellulose, used in carpets to create a silk-like appearance at a lower cost. Less durable than wool or synthetic fibers.
The green outer covering of the walnut, a traditional plant dye for brown wool. Rug dyers boil it to obtain deep brown to umber shades, and it belongs to the same vegetable palette as madder root (terracotta reds), indigo (blues) and pomegranate rind (yellows). Plant dyes of this kind are what separate traditionally dyed rugs from those colored with synthetic dyes.
The two thread systems that make up a carpet's foundation: the warp, the vertical threads strung on the loom first, and the weft, the horizontal threads passed through them between rows of knots. The foundation is usually cotton, though wool is common in tribal and older rugs and silk in very fine ones. Single-weft rugs, standard in the greater Hamadan area, show zigzag rows of white warp dots on the back and have a thinner pile, whereas double-weft construction, standard in fine, tightly woven rugs and in Bijar and Heriz, hides the warp and gives a thicker, denser pile. The warp ends form the fringe, and extra weft passes at each end form the flat-woven kilim end that secures the pile.
A natural animal fiber used for the pile, and in some rugs also the foundation, of high-quality rugs. It is durable, resilient, stain resistant and flame resistant, feels soft and cushioned underfoot, insulates against cold, and takes up dye readily and holds it for many years. It also traps dust particles, which helps reduce allergic reactions. Quality depends above all on where the sheep graze: high-elevation pastures and good feed give thicker, oilier wool, with Manchester, New Zealand and Ghazni wools the best-known prized examples. Early-spring shearing and hand spinning (finer, softer thread than machine spinning) improve it further, while thin, dry wool from dead sheep goes into cheaper rugs.
A rug base in which the warp and weft threads are wool instead of cotton. It is typical of tribal rugs such as Baluchi, Turkoman and Gabbeh (Gabbeh and Quchan sometimes use goat hair instead), turns up in some Qashqai, Shiraz, small Bakhtiari and Iranian Azerbaijan pieces, and is common in older village and tribal rugs, including some Hamadan and very antique Karaja. Experts use it as a clue to age, since rugs made after about the 1930s usually have a cotton foundation, once machine-spun cotton became widely available. Wool's soft, less rigid structure gives the design a fluid, warm character, and the fringes are sometimes braided or in different colors. The drawback is that wool shrinks and stretches with humidity, so these rugs tend to be less straight than cotton-based ones.
The stage of rug making in which cleaned, carded wool is made into yarn, either by hand or on a manual spinning wheel, and the individual threads are then twisted together into thicker strands. Twisting gives the yarn extra strength and durability, after which the wool is ready for dyeing. Hand-spun yarn is regarded as superior to machine-spun: its threads are finer and softer, and the wool looks shinier.
A rug woven in an organized workshop, a setup typical of city weaving, where a master weaver usually oversees the weavers and design and weaving follow stricter standards. Because a workshop can buy wool in bulk and dye it all at once, its material and colors tend to be better, so workshop rugs are generally of higher quality than non-workshop ones, though not in every case. Not every workshop rug is signed. Village rugs, made in a looser, semi-structured setting, usually have lower knot densities than city rugs.
Loss of pile height from use, where the wool has been walked short or away entirely, typically in a hallway, entryway or other high-traffic path, and in a badly worn rug the foundation begins to show. Even wear across the whole surface is the normal pattern on an older rug and is what buyers look for, whereas patchy wear, with short or bare zones beside fuller pile, weakens those spots and makes further damage likely, which matters most for a rug meant for heavy traffic. Rotating the rug periodically spreads the wear. Wear alone does not date a rug, since some new rugs are finished low to look old and some antiques keep a full pile.
Various techniques for coloring carpet yarns, including beck dyeing (immersion in dye baths), continuous dyeing (application after tufting), space dyeing (multiple colors on a single yarn), and solution dyeing (color added to liquid polymer before extrusion). Each method offers different benefits for colorfastness, pattern capabilities, and environmental impact. In hand-knotted rugs the wool is dyed as spun yarn before knotting, with natural dyes from plants, roots, and flowers, which tend to mellow with age, or with synthetic dyes; differences between dye batches are a main source of abrash.
The number of single yarns twisted together to form a carpet yarn. Two-ply or three-ply yarns are stronger and more durable than single-ply yarns. In hand-knotted rugs, wool is first spun into threads, by hand or on a wheel, and those threads are then twisted together into thicker, sturdier strands before the yarn is dyed.
A traditional method of dyeing carpet yarn in which loose skeins (loops) of already spun, plied yarn are immersed in dye baths before the yarn is knotted or woven into the rug. This technique, common in handmade carpets, works in separate batches, and small differences between batches, together with differences in the natural fat of the wool, produce the subtle color variations known as abrash that give traditional rugs their characteristic depth and visual interest. The process is still used by artisans who create custom-dyed yarns for specialty carpets.
Fine Persian carpets from the city of Yazd in central Iran, known for their intricate medallion designs and high-quality craftsmanship. Traditional Yazd carpets feature a central medallion with elaborate floral motifs, often incorporating silk highlights on a wool foundation. The color palette typically includes rich blues, reds, and ivories with distinctive curvilinear patterns influenced by the historic textile traditions of this ancient city.
Turkmen rugs of the Yomut, counted among the finest Turkmen pieces. Most Turkmen rugs are wool on wool, but the Yomut are known for pieces with a silk foundation under a wool pile, and the silk allows a higher knot count and more detailed drawing than is usual for the type. Grounds run to reds, browns and beige, and the rugs are typically unsigned.
Traditional floor coverings used in Central Asian nomadic dwellings (yurts). These rugs are typically made from wool with geometric patterns and serve both decorative and practical purposes, providing insulation and defining living spaces within the circular structure.
Tribal rugs from the Zagros mountains of western and southwestern Iran, woven by nomadic, semi-nomadic and settled village weavers such as the Bakhtiari, Qashqai and Luri. The weavers usually use wool from their own flocks, giving a sturdy, often dense pile on a cotton or wool foundation, colored with natural dyes in bold, rich tones. Their designs, from geometric medallions to the Bakhtiari garden-panel layout, are woven from memory and passed down through generations. Bakhtiari weaving spread across more than 200 villages after the once-nomadic tribe settled, while Qashqai nomads work on small portable looms, so their rugs seldom come in large sizes.
Tribal rugs woven by nomadic weavers in the Zanjan region in the west of Iran, near the Bijar and Hamadan weaving areas. Compact, portable looms, set up on the winter plains, keep most pieces to about 4 x 6 ft (1.2 x 1.8 m) or smaller. The foundation is usually cotton and the pile is wool from the weavers' own sheep, in geometric or Herati designs with beige, deep red and blue as main colors; older pieces often show a central medallion framed by a hexagonal one. Bijar-influenced pieces have a heavy-duty pile almost as thick as a true Bijar's, which is why they serve as a Bijar alternative; Hamadan-influenced pieces follow Hamadan designs and colors with a slightly thinner pile than Hamadan rugs.
A former Mashhad (Mashad) workshop whose rugs, no longer woven, are hard to find and are regarded as collectors' pieces. Typical examples have a cream ground with delicate floral designs on very thin branches, an allover layout with only a vaguely defined central medallion, and soft, subdued colors such as peach, blue and cream. The wool is described as soft, lanolin-rich wool from young sheep, which makes the colors look shinier. Weaving reportedly ended by the mid-1980s, because the next generation did not want to continue.
A type of Persian carpet first made in the late 19th century for the European market by the firm Ziegler & Co., with enlarged, modified traditional Persian designs in softer, muted colors suited to Western tastes. A Ziegler Mahal design marks a particular period of production, yet old Ziegler patterns are still reproduced today, so design alone cannot date a rug. The name is also one of several trade names, alongside Oushak, Peshawar, Chobi and Farahan, used for workshop rugs made in Pakistan since roughly the 1970s in traditional Persian and Turkish designs, with a wool pile on a cotton foundation; which name applies varies with design and knot density.
A traditional flat-woven textile from Iran, particularly the Yazd and Meybod regions. These cotton or wool floor coverings feature geometric patterns created using a special weaving technique that produces a reversible fabric with different patterns on each side. Historically used in mosques and homes, zilus typically display blue and white patterns with cultural and religious significance.