13'8" x 23'1" Aubusson Flat Weave Rug | Mansion Size French Design | Gold & Ivory, Brand New

Opened out on the floor, this 13'8" x 23'1" Aubusson reaches 164 inches across and 277 inches down the length, a genuine mansion size piece and one of the few formal designs that can hold a ballroom, a long gallery or a double drawing room without looking undersized. It is woven flat in the tapestry manner, with no pile at all, so the surface sits low and the drawing stays sharp: a huge ivory oval floats inside a cartouche framed field, ribbon streamers fall from gold roundels at each of the 4 corners, and the whole composition is squared off by a run of narrow banded borders. Pieces at this scale belong in the oversize rugs group, where the buyer's real constraint is square footage rather than style. The rug is brand new, never used, and ships with a certificate of authenticity.

Design and Motifs

The centre of the field carries a gold spoked rosette, 12 rays inside a beaded ring, resting on a larger ghost medallion drawn in pale lavender scrollwork that reads almost like plaster relief. Radiating out from it, the oval is diapered with small gold trefoil clovers set in even rows, a quiet repeat that keeps a very large open field from going flat. The oval is closed by a delicate garland of roses, cornflowers and blossom, then by a wide pink beige band of swan neck scrollwork edged in zigzag and pearl guard stripes. Outside the oval the ivory ground holds the classic Aubusson furniture: 4 gold framed roundels filled with rose and peony bouquets, each hung from an acanthus cartouche with trailing blue and cream ribbons, long laurel and olive sprays sweeping toward the centre, and open flower wreaths at the midpoints of each side. The border system stacks a pink ground band of blue batons and green leaves, a brown and gold arcade band, and several fine braided stripes, finishing on a plain ivory outer edge.

Gold, Ivory and the Soft Garden Palette

Gold does the structural work here, and it appears in at least 3 values: a deep antique gold in the arcade border and the rosette rays, a warm wheat gold in the roundel frames and braided stripes, and a pale butter tone in the clovers and the fine outlining. The field itself is not white but a warm ivory with a beige cast, which is what keeps the rug soft rather than stark under lamplight. Brown enters as cocoa outlining on the arcade band and as the darker shading of the laurel leaves, giving the borders their definition. Green runs from olive through sage in the foliage and leaf batons. The accent colors are the pleasure of the piece: dusty rose and salmon pink in the bouquets, powder blue in the ribbon streamers and the odd cornflower, pale lavender in the ghost medallion, all used in small quantities so the overall reading stays gold on ivory from across the room.

Aubusson Design, Woven in China

Aubusson is a town in central France whose tapestry workshops supplied the court from the 17th century onward, and the style, flat woven, pictorial, drawn from neoclassical architecture and garden ornament, has been copied ever since because nothing else looks like it. This example was woven in China, where the best contemporary hand-woven tapestry work is now done, and it is an Oriental rug in the trade sense of a handmade piece from the East. The quality shows in the things a loom cannot fake at 23 feet: the oval stays a true oval end to end, the border bands hold their width along both sides, and the curved shading in the roundels is built from graded wool wefts rather than hard outlines. Flat weave construction also makes a rug of this scale practical, since the low profile sits under doors and dining chairs and the weight stays manageable for a piece in oversize rug sizes.