6'1" x 9' Oval Chinese Art Deco Rug | Midnight Blue Shou Medallion | Bamboo Silk, Never Used

True oval rugs are made in very small numbers, because the weaver has to shape every row of knots on the loom rather than cut a shape out of a finished rectangle. This 6'1" x 9' oval is hand-knotted in China in the Art Deco manner, with a bamboo silk pile that carries a bright sheen and shifts tone as you walk around it. The field is an uninterrupted midnight blue, the drawing is sparse and confident, and the outlines are carved and clipped so each motif sits slightly proud of the ground like relief work. It is recent and completely unused, with full pile, clean cotton fringes and no restoration anywhere, and it ships with a certificate of authenticity confirming that it is hand-knotted and made in China.

Design and Motifs

The center holds a round ivory and rust roundel of the Chinese longevity type, ringed by 4 flowering sprays and 4 stylized good-fortune characters that alternate around it in a tight circle. Four more floral sprays, each with a long curling ribbon-like stem, float in the open field at the 4 quarters, and the rest of the blue ground is left deliberately empty, which is the Deco instinct: negative space doing as much work as ornament. The field is closed by an inner band of ivory cloud-head scrolls, then a narrow taupe stripe studded with rust dots, then the main ivory border with pink blossoms, green leaves and rust characters riding a dark scrolling vine. The outermost band is a brown Greek key meander that runs the whole oval perimeter, the single most recognizable Deco borrowing on the rug. Image 6 shows the reverse, where the knotting is even and the pattern reads clearly through the cotton back.

The Midnight Blue Field and Its Palette

The field is a deep midnight blue that photographs almost black where the pile lies away from the camera and opens into a clear indigo where it lies toward you, a directional shimmer that comes from the bamboo silk fiber rather than from any dye trick. Against it, the florals read as a soft rose and salmon pink, warmed at the edges and cooled with pale mint green at the flower centers. The characters and the dot band are a clean rust orange, the cloud scrolls and ribbon stems a mushroom taupe and pale putty brown, and the border ground a warm undyed ivory that keeps the whole oval from feeling heavy. It is a blue and ivory rug first, with pink and rust as the accents, so it sits comfortably with navy, cream, walnut and brass, and it lifts a pale wood floor the way the photographs show.

Chinese Weaving and Art Deco Quality

Chinese Art Deco weaving grew out of the Peking workshops of the 1920s and 1930s, where classical Chinese symbols were stripped down, spaced out and paired with Western geometry such as the Greek key. This piece follows that tradition closely: open field, a single centered roundel, restrained corner sprays and a graphic outer band. The pile is clipped and the motif edges are hand-carved, a finishing step that takes real time and gives the surface its sculpted quality, while the cotton foundation keeps the oval stable and true so it lies flat without waves. As an Oriental rug it belongs to the East Asian branch of the craft rather than the Persian one, and at roughly the footprint of standard 6x9 area rugs it covers a seating group or sits under a round table without a single straight edge in the room.