7'9" x 10'8" Persian Heriz Rug | Ivory Field Stepped Medallion | Excellent Condition

Most Heriz rugs put the red on the inside. This one does the opposite: a broad ivory ground fills the center of the field and pushes the brick red out toward the surround, so the drawing reads like ink on paper rather than pattern on a dark floor. It is the harder version of the design to find and the easier one to live with, because the ivory keeps a 7'9" x 10'8" rug from sitting heavy in a room. The wool pile is full and even with no bare patches, the ends and sides are sound, and the rug is in excellent condition throughout. It sits comfortably within the 8x11 Persian rugs group, a size that covers a seating area without crowding the walls. A certificate of authenticity is included with purchase.

Design and Motifs

The center holds a stepped, eight point medallion built entirely from straight lines and notched edges, with an inner navy frame, a red core around a small dark rosette, and 4 olive gold cartouches set at the diagonals, each filled with a tiny hooked leaf. Long serrated pendants run north and south off the medallion into the ivory ground, and the ivory itself is filled with stiff vine scrolls, serrated lancet leaves, small stylized blossoms and the little bird and animal forms village weavers slip into the open field. The 4 corners of the field carry blue and red spandrels with hooked vine arms, and the main border runs an alternating sequence of rosettes and angular vine on a dark ground, fenced by narrow guard stripes of reciprocal motifs. Everything is drawn on the grid rather than in a curve, which is exactly why collectors of geometric Persian rugs look to this weaving group first.

The Ivory, Brick Red and Blue Palette

The ivory is a warm, slightly creamy white with the faint tonal movement good undyed wool gives, so it looks like wool and not like paint. Around it the brick red field runs cool rather than orange, a clean tomato to garnet range that deepens where the knots catch the light, and the main border goes darker still into an aubergine navy that frames the whole piece. The blues do the most work in the medallion: a mid denim blue in the inner panel, an almost black navy in the outline, and small flecks of lighter sky blue scattered through the motifs. Olive gold appears in the 4 medallion cartouches and in the guard stripes, warming the cooler tones, and soft rose pink shows up in the border rosettes and in small highlights across the ivory. If you are shopping a lighter traditional floor, this belongs with the best ivory Persian rugs, since the ivory carries the room and the red grounds it.

Heriz: Village Weaving East of Tabriz

Heriz is a cluster of villages east of Tabriz, on the slopes below Mount Sabalan in northwest Persia. The water there is heavy with minerals, and the local sheep grow a coarse, high tensile fleece that is famously tough, which is the practical reason Heriz rugs survive generations of real traffic while finer city weaves wear thin. Weavers work from memory on a village loom rather than from a full cartoon, so the drawing is angular by habit: straight lines, stepped corners, serrated edges, small asymmetries between one half of the field and the other. On a cotton foundation with a thick wool pile, as here, the result is a rug with weight and body underfoot. Knot counts in this group typically run below 200 per square inch, and the achievement is not fineness but proportion, the way a single large medallion is scaled correctly to a 7'9" x 10'8" field so the ivory ground stays open and the pattern never looks crowded.