11' x 15' Persian Najafabad Rug | Isfahan Floral Medallion Design | 1970s Wool in Excellent Condition

A rug this size is a commitment, and this one earns it. Woven in Najafabad in the 1970s in the drawing tradition of the Isfahan workshops, it covers a full 11' x 15' with a madder red field, a navy starburst medallion and a slate blue border that frames the whole piece like a picture mount. The wool is the giveaway on age and quality: after roughly 50 years the pile still stands full and even across the field, with the low sheen that only good Persian wool and honest use produce. Photograph 13 shows the original inventory tag and the back, where the cotton foundation and the knot count are plainly readable. Every rug we sell ships with a certificate of authenticity recording origin, age, materials and size, and free shipping and free returns apply to all 50 states, freight-weight pieces like this one included.

Design and Motifs

The drawing is classic central Persian workshop layout: a navy medallion built as a many pointed rosette, filled with ivory and pale pink arabesque scrollwork so fine it reads as lace from standing height, with small stepped cross arms reaching out into the field. Above and below it sit slender navy pendants, and each of the 4 corners carries a large ivory spandrel drawn with curling vine and split palmettes. What lifts this piece above a plain medallion rug is the field itself, which is not empty ground but a continuous all over vine system: ivory and cream palmettes, fringed chrysanthemum heads, curling saz leaves and tiny gold and green buds, all connected by thin pale tendrils that sweep in mirrored arcs. The 5 band border repeats the theme at a smaller scale, with a broad slate blue main band of alternating palmette and rosette, an ivory guard stripe of running vine on either side, and narrow navy outer bands of repeating flower heads. The close-up frames show how the curved line holds true through every turn, which is the whole point of the Isfahan drawing tradition and only possible at a tight knot count.

Red Field, Slate Blue Border, Ivory Drawing

The field is a warm madder red, closer to brick and tomato than to burgundy, and it shifts noticeably with the light: deeper and more saturated in the raking close-ups, brighter and slightly coral where the overhead lighting hits it. Against that ground the design is carried almost entirely in ivory and soft cream, with warm apricot and blush pink in the larger flower heads, so the contrast is generous rather than harsh. The medallion and the outlines throughout drop to a deep inky navy, which anchors the whole composition and keeps the red from reading flat. The main border is a distinctly cooler tone, a dusty slate blue with a slight teal cast, and it works as a visual frame that separates the busy red field from the floor. Accents of old gold, olive and a pale powder blue appear in the small leaves and buds, and those touches of green and yellow are what make the palette feel vegetal rather than printed. Small color variation across the field is natural in hand-dyed wool and is part of what tells you this is a genuine 1970s Persian weaving rather than a modern reproduction.

Najafabad and the Isfahan Weaving Tradition

Najafabad sits a short drive west of Isfahan in central Persia, and its weavers work from the same cartoons and the same curvilinear vocabulary that made the Isfahan rugs of the Safavid workshops famous. The difference is scale and purpose: Najafabad specialized in large room and hall sizes woven in sturdy local wool on a cotton foundation, built to be walked on for generations rather than admired in a vitrine, while keeping the refined Isfahan drawing. That combination is exactly why 11' x 15' Najafabad pieces from the 1970s are still turning up in excellent condition today, and why they are among the most practical oversize Persian rugs you can buy. The back photograph shows a fine, tight and regular knot for a rug of this dimension, with crisp definition in the smallest border flowers and straight, true selvages. If you want to understand how the wool, the dyes and the weave together place a piece in a decade, our guide on how to date an Oriental rug walks through the same clues we used here.