6'5" x 9'7" Persian Nain Rug | Navy & Ivory Wool and Silk | Silk Highlighted Medallion

Weavers in Nain hold themselves to a standard few other towns attempt, and this 6'5" x 9'7" piece shows exactly what that buys you. The dark blue field is drawn so tightly that the vine work reads like embroidery, and because every leaf, stem and blossom is outlined in silk, the pattern catches the light and lifts away from the wool ground as you walk around it. Woven in the 2000's, it has been kept flat and out of traffic, so the pile still stands full and the ivory border has stayed clean and pale. Compare the overhead photograph with the close-ups of the medallion and you can follow individual silk outlines through the pattern. Like every rug we import ourselves, it ships with a certificate of authenticity recording origin, materials and size. For background on the weave and how the town grades its fineness, our guide to Persian Nain rugs is worth a read before you buy.

Design and Motifs

The layout is the classic Nain formula, executed without a shortcut anywhere. At the center sits a many-pointed star medallion built in concentric rings: a small rosette at the core, a ring of scrolling hearts and split palmettes around it, then a wide band of ivory and sky blue cartouches, each holding its own 4 petal or 8 petal flower. The medallion sits inside a large oval reserve, and the navy ground of that oval carries a dense all-over vinery of Shah Abbasi palmettes, lotus blossoms, serrated leaves and curling cloud bands, all connected by thin blue tendrils that run corner to corner without a break in the drawing. The 4 corners are filled with ivory spandrels of the same floral vocabulary, which frames the oval and makes the field read almost like an inset panel. Working outward, a narrow twisted rope stripe separates the field from the main ivory border, where palmettes and lotus heads alternate along a continuous vine, and 2 pairs of guard stripes in ivory and pale blue finish the edges. The fringe is hand-tied and even on both ends, as the corner photographs show.

Color: Midnight Navy Against Ivory and Sky Blue

The field is a deep, almost black midnight navy, the darkest of the navy blue Persian rugs we carry, and it does the heavy work here: against it, the ivory and cream flowers read almost white, and the silk outlines glint pale where the light hits them. The border is a warm ivory with a faint sandy undertone rather than a cold white, which keeps the whole rug soft in a room with wood floors. Between the two sits a broad range of blues: a clear sky blue in the medallion rings and the guard stripes, a mid denim blue in the vine work, and the near-black navy of the field and outlining. Small quantities of other colors do a lot of work close up, as the macro photographs make clear, with burgundy hearts and tiny rosettes scattered through the medallion, chocolate brown stems and leaf outlines, a few muted sage green leaf tips, and pale tan centers in the larger palmettes. Under lamplight the navy warms and the silk highlights come forward; in daylight the ivory dominates and the rug photographs lighter, which is why the overhead and angled views differ in tone.

Nain: The Town and the Weave

Nain is a small desert town in central Persia, east of Isfahan on the edge of the great salt plain, and it came to rug weaving late. Its workshops turned from fine woolen cloth to knotting in the 20th century, and they carried the tailor's habits with them: pale grounds, very fine hand-spun cotton foundations, tightly clipped low pile, and wool outlined in silk so the drawing stays crisp. Fineness in Nain is described by the number of threads twisted into each knot, and the shorter the count the finer the rug, which is why collectors chase the lowest numbers. You can judge this one directly from the photographs: the back-and-pile shot shows a low, evenly sheared surface with no loose or lazy knotting, and the medallion detail holds a clean curve on motifs no larger than a fingernail, which is only possible on a high knot count. In a 6'5" x 9'7" footprint it works as the main rug in a formal seating area or under a dining table, and it sits comfortably within the standard run of 7 x 10 Persian rugs for planning your furniture around it.