10'6" x 13'7" Persian Kashan Rug | Silver Open Field | All-Over Floral and Paisley | Excellent

A pale silver ground carrying an unbroken floral drawing across more than 140 square feet, this rug takes the classic Kashan vocabulary and lightens it completely. Most Persian Kashan rugs are woven on a deep madder red or indigo ground, so a silver field of this scale is the unusual one, and it changes how the blues and rusts read entirely. The weave is hand-knotted wool on a cotton foundation with a 3/8" pile, still full and even edge to edge, and the selvedges and fringes are intact. At 10'6" x 13'7" it sits squarely in the 10x14 Persian rugs range, large enough to carry a full seating group with every leg on the wool. Every rug we ship travels with a certificate of authenticity documenting origin, materials and construction.

Design and Motifs

There is no formal border band here. The pattern is drawn as one continuous composition that floats inside a wide plain silver margin, which is a confident choice by the designer and gives the rug an open, almost airy look for a piece this large. At the center a soft diamond gathers itself out of the pattern rather than being outlined: paired curling leaves, a small blue rosette and a stacked cluster of blossoms read as a medallion from a standing height and dissolve back into the field up close. Around it the field fills with 4 large corner cartouches built from ivory arabesque scrolls loaded with paisley boteh, each boteh filled with its own tiny florals and pearl beading. Between them run feathery serrated leaves, 8 petal rosettes, carnations, tulip sprays and slender flowering vines that cross and re-cross without a single repeat you can catch with the eye. The drawing is curvilinear throughout, which is the Kashan signature, and the vine lines stay smooth through their turns.

Silver Charm, Brilliant Blue and Olive Brown

The ground is the silver charm tone named in the specs, a light grey with a faint green ivory undertone that behaves like a neutral in a furnished room. Against it the blues do the real work, and there are several of them: a brilliant cobalt in the boteh outlines and the larger blossoms, a deeper indigo in the leaf tips and flower centers, and a chalky powder blue in the smaller sprays that keeps the whole field from going heavy. Olive brown carries the vine stems and the feathered leaves, warming the grey wherever it runs. Scattered through the blossoms are small hits of rust, brick red, deep burgundy and a soft apricot, with tiny points of saffron yellow and clean ivory at the flower hearts. The ivory cartouches are the brightest element and pull the eye out to the 4 corners. Nothing in the palette shouts, which is why this rug settles easily next to grey, navy, camel or walnut furniture.

Kashan Weaving in Central Persia

Kashan lies in central Persia, north of Isfahan, and its looms descend directly from the Safavid court workshops that set the standard for curvilinear floral weaving. The town is known for soft lustrous local wool and for the discipline of its cartoons, and the classic formula most people picture is a red field with a navy lobed medallion and ivory spandrels. When you watch Shark Tank there is a Persian Kashan on the floor. This piece keeps the Kashan drawing and the Kashan wool but abandons the classic ground color, which is what workshops in the town did for clients who wanted the pattern without the weight of red. The reverse tells you the rest: a tight, regular grid of knots on a cotton warp, with the design legible from the back, and a pile still standing a full 3/8" after its life so far.