7'9" x 11'6" Persian Sarouk Rug | Cornell Red All-Over Floral | 8 Point Star Medallion | Signed Cartouche

Laid flat, this 7'9" x 11'6" Persian Sarouk rug reads as one continuous red garden with a single gold star burning at the center of it. It is hand-knotted in wool on a cotton foundation, the 3/8" pile still standing upright and even from end to end, with original sides and finished ends and no thin spots anywhere in the field. An ivory cartouche is woven into the top border, the mark of a weaver who expected the piece to be recognized later. The proportions are among the most usable of the large Persian rugs we import, long enough to carry a seating group without crowding the walls. It ships with a certificate of authenticity, and if you want the deeper background, our Persian Sarouk rugs guide covers the type in full.

Design and Motifs

The center holds an 8 point star medallion drawn in deep navy with crisp ivory outlining, and inside it sits a saffron gold 8 petal rosette built around a small blue and coral center. Navy palmettes flare from the top and bottom points of the star, anchoring it to the field. Around that medallion the weaver ran a true all-over floral composition rather than an open ground: large curled saz leaves, serrated palmettes, tulip buds and rosettes chained together on thin vines that mirror each other across both axes, so the pattern stays balanced without ever repeating a motif twice in the same way. The 4 corners carry sky blue spandrels filled with arabesque scrollwork and ivory tipped leaves, and they frame the field cleanly. The main border is navy, set with alternating palmettes and rosettes on a reciprocal vine, and it is flanked by 5 narrow guard stripes, including a gold and blue zigzag stripe and a small ivory floral meander that gives the edge its finished, workshop look.

The Cornell Red Field and Its Blues

The field is Cornell red, a warm tomato toned red with a faint brick undertone that shifts toward carmine where the light strikes the pile and drops to a darker wine where it falls away. Against it the weaver worked 2 distinct blues: an inky navy that carries the medallion, the palmettes and the main border, and a lighter sky blue, almost cerulean, that fills the corner spandrels and the inner guard stripe and keeps the whole thing from reading heavy. Ivory does the outlining work, tracing the star points, the leaf edges and the small border meander, which is what makes the drawing legible from across a room. Saffron gold appears in the central rosette and in one thin border stripe, sage green shades a handful of leaves and buds, and small touches of coral and peach warm the flower heads. It is a saturated, formal palette rather than a washed one, so it sits naturally with dark woods and works well for buyers shopping red and burgundy Persian rugs.

Sarouk Weaving and Quality

Sarouk is a village in the Markazi region of central Persia, north of Arak and beside the old Farahan weaving district, and its reputation was built on 2 things: dense, heavy handling wool and curvilinear floral drawing done on a cotton foundation with the Persian knot. That is exactly what this piece shows. The back, seen against a ruler, is tight and regular, with straight rows and no lazy lines, and the knot count sits comfortably above ordinary village work without reaching for workshop city fineness. The wool is springy and slightly lustrous, the kind that packs down under furniture and comes back rather than crushing flat, which is why Sarouk rugs of this generation are still in circulation and still holding their pile. The woven cartouche in the upper border points to a named workshop weaving to order, and the symmetry of the field, corner to corner and end to end, backs that up.