10'3" x 13'6" Persian Khorasan Rug | Lavar Kermanshah Floral Medallion | Signed Semi Antique

This is a signed semi antique room size piece from Khorasan in northeast Persia, drawn in the classic Lavar Kermanshah manner and woven at 10'3" x 13'6". The weaver put his name into a cartouche in the main border, which is the first thing a dealer looks for, and the second small cartouche beside it carries woven numerals. The pile is wool at a low 1/4" clip over a cotton foundation, which is exactly why the drawing reads so clearly across a field this large: nothing is buried in deep pile. Decades of use have taken the reds down to a soft rose and left light wear and some old repair in places, all of which is shown in the photographs rather than edited out. It sits comfortably in the 10x14 Persian rugs range, and it ships with a certificate of authenticity.

Design and Motifs

The layout is a full Lavar Kermanshah composition: a round central medallion built out of concentric rings of petals around a small rosette core, finished with a pointed pendant at each end. Around it the field is packed with curling arabesque vines, split palmettes, serrated leaves and small 8 petal rosettes, dense enough that there is no open ground anywhere, and the 4 corner spandrels repeat the same vocabulary on a darker ground so the medallion reads as if it floats. The border system runs 5 bands deep: a wide indigo main border of alternating palmettes and flowering sprays, ivory guard stripes carrying a meandering vine on either side, and a salmon outer band of paired blossoms broken by the small numeral cartouche. The signature cartouche sits inside the main border on the end of the rug, an arched panel of blue and red with the script reserved in ivory, and the tree like flowering sprays that flank it are drawn with the same curved line as the field. Both ends finish in a red kilim skirt and long ivory cotton fringe.

A Multi-Color Palette Led by Rose Red and Indigo

The field colour is the signature of the piece: a madder red that has mellowed toward raspberry and dusty rose, cooler in the centre and warmer at the ends, with the gentle abrash of naturally dyed wool visible in the close-up. Against it the vinework is carried in deep indigo, and that same indigo forms the main border, which is dark enough at a distance to frame the field like a picture mat. Between the two sit the lighter accents that make the rug feel airy rather than heavy: sky blue and powder blue rosettes, soft sage and bottle green leaves, apricot and salmon palmettes, clean ivory outlining, and touches of aubergine, camel brown and pale pink in the smaller blossoms. The ivory guard stripes and the salmon outer border lift the whole perimeter, and the red end finish ties back to the field. It is a genuine multi-colour rug that still reads as a red and navy rug from across a room, which makes it easy to place with either warm woods or cooler grey and charcoal upholstery.

Khorasan Weaving and the Quality of This Piece

Khorasan is the province of northeast Persia whose weaving has always been organised around its capital, and rugs from these workshops are traded and catalogued within the same family as Persian Mashad rugs. The region's wool is long stapled and takes dye beautifully, and its weavers built a reputation for large, formally drawn commissions rather than village geometry, which is why the curved line here holds true over 13'6" without the medallion drifting off centre. That this rug is signed matters: a cartouche means a workshop piece with someone willing to put a name to it, and it gives a collector a starting point for research and for putting a date on the weaving, the sort of evidence covered in our guide on how to date an oriental rug. The construction is orthodox for the region and for the period: a cotton warp and weft, a firm hand-knotted wool pile clipped low, and a back that shows tight, even rows the full width of the rug.