11'9" x 17'9" Oriental Rug | Plum Purple & Gold All Over Floral | Hand-Knotted in India, Brand New

At 11'9" x 17'9" this is a true room-filling piece, hand-knotted in India in wool with a 3/8" pile that still has its full original height. The colour pairing is what stops people: a deep plum purple ground, closer to aubergine than navy, carrying a lattice of big saffron gold palmettes, with a broad gold main border wrapping the whole field. It is brand new and never used, and it ships with a certificate of authenticity. Buyers shopping oversize 12x18 Oriental rugs rarely find this colourway, and almost never in a piece this fresh.

Design and Motifs

The field runs an all over floral lattice rather than a single medallion, so the drawing repeats evenly from end to end with no dominant centre. Large gold palmettes sit on alternating rows, outlined in burgundy red and filled with small rosettes, curling leaves and pale green sprays. Between them sit smaller gold diamonds and cartouche panels, each one finished with its own tiny flower head, and the whole ground is knitted together by thin red and rose vines that scroll continuously around the motifs. The border system is layered: a wide gold main band of blossoms and leafy stems, a rose pink secondary band, and red guard stripes with a repeating rosette and leaf chain, closed by a plum outer edge and ivory fringe. Corners are resolved cleanly, which on a 4 sided border of this width is the mark of a carefully followed cartoon.

Colour Palette

The dominant reading is plum purple and gold. The ground is a smoky aubergine plum that shifts toward brown-purple under direct light and toward true violet in shade, which the close-up photos show clearly. Against it the gold is bright and saturated, a saffron to marigold tone with a strong sheen from the wool, and it is used twice: once for the palmettes floating on the plum field, once for the wide outer border, so the eye reads a glowing gold frame around a dark centre. Burgundy red does the outlining work throughout, giving every motif a crisp edge. Rose pink appears as a soft secondary border band and inside the smaller flower heads, sage green as leaves and sprays, and ivory as tiny highlight petals that keep the darker tones from going flat. Fold lines visible in the flat photos are from storage, not wear, and relax once the rug is laid out.

Origin and Weaving Quality

This rug was made in India, which is where most of the world's best contemporary hand-knotted weaving is now produced, and the workshops there handle classical floral drawing at a level that stands comparison with any traditional centre. The reverse shows a tight, even knot count with each motif fully legible from the back, straight sides and a flat handle with no buckling, which is what you want on a piece close to 18 feet long. The wool is dense and springy with real lustre, the 3/8" pile giving weight underfoot without looking shaggy. If you are weighing an Oriental rug against other options at this scale, see how it sits with the rest of our oversized hand-knotted rugs.