12' x 18'1" Persian Tabriz Rug | Tree of Life with Birds and Deer | Semi-Antique Dark Green

A dark green ground this size is uncommon, and a dark green ground filled edge to edge with trees, birds and grazing animals is rarer still. This semi-antique Persian Tabriz measures 12' x 18'1", covers a genuinely large room, and reads as one continuous garden rather than a repeating pattern. The pile is wool on a cotton foundation, hand-knotted throughout, with a soft sheen in the field that the detail photographs pick up well. It sits comfortably among oversize 12x18 Persian rugs but stands apart from most of them on colour alone. Every rug we sell ships with a certificate of authenticity.

Design and Motifs

The field is a mirrored tree of life worked as an all over design with no central medallion. Gold and tan vines rise from the base and split into branches that carry rosettes, tulips, carnations and small palmettes, and the same composition repeats in reverse down the length so the rug reads correctly from either end. Slim cypress trees stand between the larger trunks. Among the branches the weaver placed birds in profile, long tailed peacocks with fanned crests, a pair of spotted leopards low in the field, and deer standing under the foliage, all drawn small enough that you find them one at a time rather than all at once. Each corner of the border carries a large lobed cartouche filled with blossoms, and the main band runs a linked series of floral medallions and leafy scrolls between narrow guard stripes of repeating rosettes.

A Deep Green Field Framed in Rose and Gold

The ground is a saturated bottle green that shifts toward emerald where the light catches the pile and toward near black in the shadowed areas, the sort of depth only wool takes. Against it the vine work is old gold and honey tan, and the flowers are picked out in rose, raspberry, coral pink, soft peach, ivory and two distinct blues, one a clear turquoise and the other a deep indigo used for outlining. The wide main border swings the palette the other way, a dusty rose ground carrying green, blue and gold florals, with the corner cartouches set on warm gold. A final narrow green outer band and ivory cotton fringe close the rug. Buyers looking specifically at green Persian rugs in a large size will know how few of them exist with a border this warm.

Woven in Tabriz, Northwest Persia

Tabriz has been the commercial and artistic centre of northwest Persian weaving for centuries, and it is the town that turned the curved line into a discipline. Tabriz weavers work on a cotton foundation with a hook knife, following a cartoon, which is what allows the flowing vine and the accurately drawn animals seen here rather than the angular shorthand of village work. A tree of life at 12' x 18'1" is a workshop undertaking: the two halves of the composition have to mirror each other across more than 18 feet of length, and the drawing holds true from one end to the other. The back photograph shows an even, tightly packed weave with straight, regular rows, and the pile stands full with no low spots, which is why the condition is listed as perfect.