8'1" x 9'10" Pakistani Moroccan Rug | Wool | Taupe and Black

A rectangular rug of 8'1" x 9'10", hand-knotted in Pakistan in a Moroccan design, with a half-inch pile of wool. At a glance it is two colours and nothing else: a pale taupe ground crossed by dark banding that runs more or less horizontally across the width, breaking into points and forks as it goes. The ends finish in a short flat-woven band and thick plied tassels.

The design

There is no border and no medallion. The whole field is given over to a branching pattern of bands, each one drawn freehand, so that no two run the same course: some travel the full width as a shallow zigzag, others taper to a point halfway across or split into two or three fingers. Near the centre the bands pile into a loose diamond, and along the lower edge they flatten out into long horizontal strokes with hooked ends. The stepped edges of each band, visible in the close detail, come from the knots themselves rather than from any attempt at a curved outline, which gives the drawing its modern, almost drawn-with-a-brush character.

The colour

The ground is a pale, slightly warm taupe, closer to undyed cream where the pile catches the light and grey-beige in the shadow between the knot rows. Against it the banding reads as near black at arm's length and as a deep coffee brown up close, with paler brown fibres mixed through it that keep the dark areas from going flat. The fringe and the flat-woven end bands are the same pale taupe as the field, with a few dark warp threads showing through.

The making

Hand-knotted in Pakistan on a wool pile cut to half an inch, with the chunky, open knotting seen in the folded corner and the reverse: the rows are clearly countable and the pattern reads almost as sharply on the back as on the front. The table records the rug as new and in perfect condition, which matches the photographs, where the pile stands evenly and the sides and ends are intact. It sits among the heavier, coarser-knotted work in our hand-knotted rugs, and is one of the newly woven pieces rather than anything with age on it.