8'8" x 11'7" Chinese Oriental Rug | Tabriz Design | Black Field with Burgundy Border | New, Never Used

This is a formal, densely drawn Oriental rug hand-knotted in China to a classic Tabriz drawing, measuring 8'8" x 11'7" with a 3/8" wool pile on a cotton foundation. It has never been used, the pile stands full and even edge to edge, and the ivory fringe at both ends is clean and untrimmed. At this size it sits squarely in the most useful room format there is, the 9x12 class, and buyers comparing 9x12 rugs will notice immediately that the drawing here is finer and more controlled than the usual commercial weave in this footprint. Every rug ships with a certificate of authenticity confirming the hand-knotted construction, materials and measurements.

Design and Motifs

The field carries no medallion at all. Instead it is a continuous all-over floral design, built from thin vine scrolls that split, curve back on themselves and carry palmettes, rosettes, tulip heads and long serrated leaves in mirrored pairs up the length of the rug. Look at the close-up and you can follow a single vine through several turns before it terminates in a flower head, which is exactly what a Tabriz cartoon is supposed to do. The border system runs 5 bands: a burgundy main border of alternating palmettes and leaf sprays, a pair of ivory guard stripes drawn with a small repeating flower and reciprocal cresting, and a narrow dark outer stripe with a fine sawtooth edge. Corners resolve cleanly, with the main border pattern turning properly rather than being cut off, a sign the cartoon was drawn for this exact size.

A Black Field with Burgundy, Ivory and Sage

The ground is a true black that reads slightly blue under daylight, and it does what a dark ground is meant to do: it pushes every flower forward. Against it the palmettes come up in soft rose, dusty salmon and warm tan, the leaves in sage and celadon green, and the smaller blossoms in cream and pale gold, with occasional flecks of deep red inside a flower head for depth. The main border is a deep burgundy wine red, cooler and more restrained than a bright Persian red, and it is separated from the black field by ivory guard bands that give the whole rug a clean drawn outline. The wool takes light well, so the pile shifts between a matte dark and a soft sheen as you walk around it. This palette is easy to live with: black anchors a room without going cold, and the burgundy and sage give you a warm color story to build furniture and drapery around.

Origin and Weaving Quality

Made in China, this piece belongs to the tradition of Chinese workshops weaving classical Tabriz cartoons for the export market, a body of work that at its best rivals village weaving anywhere for precision of line. The knot count here is high enough to carry curved vine work and small flower heads without the drawing turning blocky, which is the honest test of whether a floral cartoon has been woven finely enough. The foundation is cotton, warps sit straight, the rug lies flat, and the selvages are tightly overcast. The pile is clipped to 3/8", low enough to keep the pattern crisp and heavy enough to wear for decades under real traffic. The ruler shot shows the back and the fringe, so you can see for yourself that the knots are tied by hand, row by row, and that the fringe is the continuation of the warp rather than a sewn-on addition.