5'6" x 8'2" Persian Nain Rug | Burgundy Field & Ivory Medallion | Kork Wool & Silk

Nain almost never leaves the ivory and blue formula it is famous for, which is exactly why this one stops you. The field here is a deep burgundy, and the whole familiar vocabulary of the town, the tight scrolling vine, the lobed center medallion, the silk outlined blossoms, sits on top of that wine ground instead of the usual cream. Woven in the 2000's at 5'6" x 8'2", it is a medium room size that works under a coffee table, at the foot of a bed or in a study, and the pile is still full and even with no wear anywhere on the surface. If you want the background on how the town grades its weaving, our Persian Nain rug guide covers it in detail. Every rug we ship carries a certificate of authenticity recording origin, materials and measurements.

Design and Motifs

A lobed central medallion in cream and pale blue anchors the field, with a small dark rosette at its core and a ring of tiny blue and black buds circling it. From the medallion the drawing opens into a dense all over vine: curling leaves, cusped palmettes and rounded rosettes that repeat in strict mirror symmetry along both axes, so the top half and the bottom half read as exact reflections. The burgundy ground is shaped as a large ogee, crowned at each end by an arched cluster of leaf forms and closed off by ivory spandrels at all 4 corners. The main border runs on an ivory ground with a running vine and evenly spaced 8 petal star rosettes picked out in dark navy, framed by narrow light blue guard stripes on both sides. Look at the corner close-up and you can see the borders turn correctly, the vine meeting itself cleanly at the corner instead of being cut off, which is the sign of a properly resolved cartoon rather than a weaver improvising to fill space.

The Burgundy, Cream and Light Blue Palette

The field is a true burgundy, closer to wine or oxblood than to the bright madder red of a Kashan, and it stays even across the whole 8'2" length with no abrash streaking. Against it the blossoms are worked in cream and a warm ivory, with a softer beige tone in the larger palmettes that keeps them from flattening into one block of white. The pale light blue is the color that does the real work: it fills the heart of the medallion, the guard stripes and the interiors of many of the flower heads, cooling the burgundy down and pulling the whole design toward a calm, almost silvery register. Black is used sparingly and only as line, outlining the star rosettes in the border and the smallest details in the field, which sharpens the drawing at close range. The silk accents are easiest to read in the corner photograph, where the outlined petals catch light differently from the surrounding kork wool and lift slightly off the wool ground as you walk around the rug.

Nain: Weaving Town and Weaving Quality

Nain sits on the edge of the central Persian desert, east of Isfahan, and came to rug weaving late. The town wove fine wool cloth for centuries and only turned to knotting in the 20th century, which is why its work looks like Isfahan drawing translated into a cooler, more restrained palette. Nain grades its own weaving by the number of threads twisted into each warp bundle, 9La, 6La and 4La, with the lower numbers meaning finer warps and a tighter knot. What matters to a buyer is what that fineness allows: a curved line that stays curved, a palmette that keeps its shape at 2 inches across, and a clipped low pile that holds detail rather than blurring it. This piece is woven on a cotton foundation with a kork wool pile and silk outlining, the standard construction of the town's good workshop production, and the density of the back shown in the last photograph is consistent with that level of work.