8'1" x 11'5" Persian Bijar Rug | Apple Red All Over Design | 260 KPSI Fine Wool

This is a recent Bijar in perfect, never used condition, and it does the hardest thing a weaver can attempt: it carries one repeating pattern across the whole field with no medallion to hide behind. Any drift in the drawing would show instantly, and there is none here. The pile is the finer grade of wool that Bijar workshops keep for their best commissions, knotted at approximately 260 knots per square inch on a cotton foundation, then beaten down with the metal comb that makes this weave famous. The rug has real weight in the hand and a short, upright pile that will take a dining chair or a sofa leg without flattening. It ships with our certificate of authenticity.

Design and Motifs

The field is a continuous lattice built from curling ivory vines that meet, cross and open into paired serrated lancet leaves, the drawing vocabulary of the Herati family that Bijar weavers have used for generations. Inside each pairing sits a small ochre palmette or a cupped bud, and between them float 8 petal rosettes, star flowers and tiny sky blue blossoms scattered so densely that almost no ground is left bare. The main border is ivory and reads like a chain: navy lozenge cartouches set with rose and green rosettes, separated by long turning arabesque leaves and boteh-like scrolls. Two narrow guard stripes in rose and indigo frame it on both sides, and all 4 corners are resolved cleanly, with the border pattern turning the angle without a broken repeat or a squeezed motif.

Apple Red Ground With Ivory and Indigo

The ground is an apple red that leans toward warm salmon and terracotta in daylight, a softer and more furnishable red than the blood tones of older Kurdish work. Over it the vine work is drawn in ivory and pale cream, which is what gives the field its lift and keeps such a busy pattern legible from standing height. The outlines and small leaf clusters are deep indigo, nearly black in the border cartouches, and they are relieved by a lighter sky blue in the petals and by two greens, a dark forest tone in the leaves and a soft olive in the smaller sprays. Ochre and old gold appear in the palmettes and in the border arabesques, and touches of madder rose and pale peach turn up in the rosette centers. The main border is a clear ivory, the selvedge is bound in navy, and the fringe is natural undyed cotton.

Bijar, the Iron Rug of Persia

Bijar is a Kurdish town in the Garrus district of northwestern Persia, and its weavers work on a heavily tensioned loom, packing each row of knots with a metal comb until the fabric is so compressed it can barely be folded. That is why Persian Bijar rugs are called the iron rugs of Persia and why they outlive the houses they are bought for. Much village Bijar work sits well under 200 knots per square inch, so approximately 260 here, paired with the finer wool and the curvilinear vine drawing, puts this piece in the town's upper workshop grade rather than its everyday output. Buyers comparing the town's various weaving groups will find the differences between Bijar, Bijar Zanjan, Bijar Tekab and Bijar Bukan worth reading before they commit. Among 8x11 Persian rugs, this is the format that anchors a full seating group or a table for 8, and this weave is heavy enough to stay flat and true for decades.