8'9" x 11'9" Heriz Serapi Rug | Coral Red Field, Navy Star Medallion | New, Made in India

A brand new hand-knotted Serapi in true room size, this 8'9" x 11'9" rug carries the bold angular drawing that makes the Heriz Serapi pattern the most recognisable geometric medallion layout in the trade. The pile is wool on a cotton foundation, the weave is firm and even across all 4 corners, and the rug has never been laid on a floor, so the nap still stands upright and the fringe is untouched. At 105" by 141" it sits squarely in the standard 9x12 Oriental rugs footprint, so it will take a full seating group or a 10 seat table without crowding the walls. Every rug we ship leaves Freeport with a certificate of authenticity recording size, material, weave and origin.

Design and Motifs

The field is organised around a large 8 pointed navy star medallion with a rose coloured inner panel and a small 8 petal rosette at the dead centre. Four ivory cartouches sit inside the star, each one filled with a soft blue boteh, and long serrated olive and green leaf forms radiate out toward the points. Above and below the medallion, navy spade shaped pendants with feathered edges anchor the vertical axis, and the open coral ground between them is filled with hooked vine scrolls, angular rosettes and small vase forms drawn in straight lines rather than curves, exactly as the pattern demands. The stepped light blue spandrels cut into the field at all 4 corners and carry their own green and salmon vase panels. The main navy border runs a reciprocating sequence of serrated diamonds and palmettes, framed inside and out by camel gold guard stripes of leaf vine, with a fine checkered minor stripe that gives the whole drawing its crispness. Anyone shopping geometric medallion rugs will recognise how cleanly this one resolves.

Coral Red, Indigo and Sky Blue Color Story

The field reads as a warm coral rustic red, a brick and terracotta tone rather than a cherry red, with gentle variation across the width that softens the ground and keeps it from looking printed. Against it the medallion and the main border are a deep indigo navy that goes almost black where the pile falls away from the light, visible in the rolled and folded photographs. The stepped spandrels and the small accents inside the field are a pale sky blue, cool enough to lift the red, while the guard borders are a clear camel gold that frames the whole rug and picks up warm light. Ivory appears in the medallion cartouches, in the border rosettes and along the fringe, and two distinct greens are used, a dark olive in the serrated leaves and a brighter grass green in the small corner panels and border diamonds. Rose, salmon and a touch of aubergine fill out the palette in the medallion core.

Made in India: Weaving and Quality

This piece is honestly made in India, where most of the world's best contemporary hand-knotted weaving is now produced. The weavers working this Serapi Heriz drawing use hand-spun wool, muted dye lots and a firm double weft construction that you can see on the back of the rug in the final photographs, where the knot rows sit straight and the pattern is as legible from behind as it is from the front. The pile is cut heavy, which is correct for this design and the reason a Serapi takes traffic for decades, and the selvedges are overcast in red wool while the fringe is hand tied rather than machine finished. If you are weighing this against a village woven antique, the comparison between a true Oriental rug and a modern reproduction is worth reading before you decide.