Persian Rugs 

     One of the best ways to introduce you into the realm of Persian rugs is putting you in touch with the definition of a rug and to approach little by little its most important characteristics. Rug lovers perfectly know what a rug is, but most people don’t. Using simple words we can describe a rug as a piece of cloth or wool which is placed on floors or walls for decorating purposes but here is much more to say about them.

            Oriental rug is the generic label given to rugs, either knotted or woven, made in small workshops, in large factories or by nomads. Inside this wide category there are subcategories according to its origin.  Persian rugs is one of them, together with Anatolian rugs, Tibetan rugs, Chinese rugs, and many others from a vast region which includes countries from the Far and Middle East such as China, Turkey and India just to name some.

     Naturally, evolution and technology have influenced almost every single process in our lives. The techniques to make a Persian rug are not an exception and they have also     become mechanized.  However, the tradition of hand woven rugs has survived through the centuries making it possible to find hand made rugs all over the world. Not surprisingly, the cost of the hand made ones is higher than the mass-produced ones. The fact that both, hand made and machine made are considered Persian rugs is still a subject for discussion. It’s widely believed that the genuine Persian rug is the hand woven one.

 Persian Rugs are made through a procedure called weaving, which can last for months and even years if they are handmade products. The basic method used to create hand-knotted rugs is almost the same as it was thousands of years ago. This kind of rug possess a foundation made of pair sets of yarns (a long continuous fiber made of cotton, wool, silk or goat’s or camel’s hair), they are called warp and weft of the loom.  To put some light over this, the loom is the device used for weaving and the warp is the series of threads fastened to the loom.

        Hand made Persian rugs are considered knotted pile rugs. To make the pile, knots are tied around pairs of adjacent warps. Between each row of knots, one or more shots of weft are passed through the warp so as to secure the knotted row. The knot used for oriental rugs is the asymmetrical knot also called Persian or Senneh knot.  This kind of knot has many particularities: firstly, it is fabulous if a delicate and detailed design is required since knots can be packed close together; secondly, they look like incomplete knots since it wraps around two warps but just one warp is completely encircled; and finally, they can be wrapped in both directions, that is to say they may be either open to the right or open to the left. 

            It is worth mentioning that Persian rugs are one of the most significant manifestations of the Persian art, life and culture which have lasted for more than 5000 years, surviving through time, wars and empires.

All the characteristics we mentioned, together with its well known beauty and elegance turn the Persian rug into a unique and precious treasure.