15'8" x 22' Persian Kerman Rug | Open Field Crimson Medallion | 1960s Mansion Size

At 15'8" x 22" wide by 22' long this is a genuine mansion piece, hand-knotted in Kerman in the 1960s and still standing on a full, even wool pile with no low spots anywhere across the field. It belongs to the small group of oversize Persian rugs woven wide enough to cover a great room or a long banquet table with float on every side. The drawing follows the classic Kerman open field formula: a deep crimson ground left almost bare so the eye travels straight to the small navy and ivory medallion, with all of the density pushed out to the spandrels and the wide floral border. It ships with a certificate of authenticity.

Design and Motifs

The center medallion is deliberately small for a rug of this scale: a navy cartouche holding a single pink rose, ringed in ivory and pale blue leafwork, with slender floral pendants dropping above and below it into the open red. Around that opening runs a scalloped wreath of roses, buds and feathery acanthus scroll that defines the oval field without closing it in. The 4 corners fill with ivory and blush spandrels packed with vases, curling palmettes and thin green stems, and the main border turns indigo with alternating rose bouquets, cartouches and lotus heads. Two narrow guard stripes in red and ivory hold the whole composition together, and the corner resolution is clean, with the border pattern turning correctly at each angle rather than being cut short.

A Crimson Field Framed in Ivory, Navy and Celadon

The field is a true cherry crimson, saturated and slightly cool, with the gentle abrash that comes from natural dyeing in separate lots and gives a field this large its movement. Against it the spandrels read ivory drifting into blush and shell pink, and the wide main border drops to a deep indigo navy that anchors all 4 sides. Inside that navy the palette opens up: celadon and olive green in the leaves, powder and sky blue in the small blossoms, rose and raspberry pink in the roses, and bright saffron gold used sparingly as a highlight on stems and petal tips. The close-up photographs show how clean those pastel tones have stayed against the red, which is the hallmark of good Kerman wool.

Kerman Weaving in Southeast Persia

Kerman sits in the high desert of southeastern Persia and has supplied the export market with large-format floor pieces longer than almost any other weaving city, which is why so many of the great American houses of the mid century were furnished with them. The signature there is the pictorial floral border and the rose-heavy drawing seen here, worked on a cotton foundation with a finely spun wool pile and a weave fine enough to render curved stems and individual petals without breaking the line. A 15'8" x 22' loom is a commissioned undertaking, with several weavers seated side by side for years, and the consistency of the knotting across this width tells you it came out of an organized city workshop. Collectors reading the wool, the dye behavior and the border drawing can place a piece like this to its decade; our guide to how to date an oriental rug walks through the same signals, and more Persian Kerman rugs are shown alongside it.