6'7" x 9'8" Persian Ardakan Rug | Red | Medallion

A hand-knotted rug from Persia in the Ardakan manner, measuring 6'7" x 9'8" and falling in the 6x9 to 8x10 range. The ground is a clear madder red, worked edge to edge with small flowerheads, palmettes and curling leaves, and held together by a lobed navy medallion at the centre. The rectangular format is close to a true three-by-two, and the condition is listed as excellent.

Design

The field is laid out as a shaped cartouche: the red ground is pinched in at the four corners by deep navy spandrels filled with the same floral vocabulary, so the inner field reads as a long lobed panel rather than a plain rectangle. At its centre sits a stepped medallion, navy at the outer lobes, ivory in the next ring, with a small sky blue diamond and a single rosette at the very middle, and a pendant finial running off each end towards the ends of the rug. Around it the vine runs in every direction, rosettes, serrated leaves and curled split palmettes, dense enough that no large patch of ground is left open. The main border is navy, carrying a turning vine of palmettes and flower sprays, and it is flanked on both sides by ivory guard stripes with a small running flower and a fine dark reciprocal line at the outermost edge.

Colour

The ground is a madder red that cools towards raspberry in the open areas and darkens where the pile lies away from the light. Against it the indigo navy of the medallion, spandrels and main border does most of the structural work, with ivory used sparingly and to effect: in the guard stripes, in the ring around the medallion, and in single flowerheads scattered across the field. The secondary colours are a soft sky blue, an olive green in the leaves, and a warm walnut brown that appears in the palmette hearts and in some of the scrolling leaf forms.

Making

Hand-knotted in Persia, with a cut pile and a weave fine enough that the drawing of the small flowerheads stays crisp, as the back photograph with the rule laid across it shows. The spec table records no fibre for this piece, so none is claimed here. The ends are finished with a short fringe and the edges are overcast in dark wool. Condition is given as excellent, and the piece sits alongside the rest of the hand-knotted stock.