8' x 12' Persian Mashad Rug | Sarouk Floral Medallion Design | Estate Piece in Excellent Condition

This is an estate piece, and it looks the part. The 3/8" wool pile still stands up across the whole 8' x 12' surface, the dark pink field has no thin spots, and the wool keeps the dry lanolin sheen that good Khorasan fleece holds for decades. It is hand-knotted in wool on a cotton foundation, and the drawing follows the Sarouk formula of a single lobed medallion floating in a field of fine floral vine, which Mashad looms interpreted in their own softer, more open way. Photographs 2, 4 and 6 show it laid flat on the showroom floor so you can read the proportions honestly: a true room-size rug that covers a seating group without crowding it. Every rug we ship carries a certificate of authenticity recording origin, materials and hand-knotted construction, so this Persian Mashad rug arrives documented as well as described.

Design and Motifs

The center carries an indigo lobed medallion with an 8 petal rosette at its heart, ringed by apricot and blue palmettes, with a slender pendant dropping from each end into the field. The 4 corners answer it with matching indigo spandrels, each filled with scrolling leaf and blossom work and anchored by a large curled palmette. Between medallion and corners the field is covered edge to edge with thin curving vines, small multi-petal blossoms, split leaves and serrated palmettes drawn in the curvilinear Sarouk design tradition rather than in village angles. Three borders frame the whole: a wide indigo main band of alternating palmettes and arabesque vine, flanked by ivory guard stripes of reciprocal scrolling vine, then a narrow outer band of repeating blossoms that finishes against a plain red selvage. The close view in photograph 3 shows how tightly the vine work is resolved, with each leaf outlined in a second color so the pattern reads clearly instead of blurring together.

Color: Dark Pink Field, Indigo Borders, Cool Blue Vinework

The field is a deep dark pink that reads closer to raspberry or old rose in daylight, cooler and less orange than the brick reds of western Persia, and it is the reason this rug sits so easily with grey, charcoal and walnut furniture. Against it the medallion and main border go almost black indigo, a near navy that gives the composition its weight. The vine work is where the color actually lives: cool blue and soft teal leaves, pale sky blue tendrils, ivory and cream outlines that keep every stem legible, and small apricot and soft orange blossoms scattered through the medallion, the spandrels and the main border. Ivory appears again in the guard stripes, drawing two bright lines around the dark border so the frame does not swallow the field. Looking for more rugs in this family of tones, see the full run of pink and purple Persian rugs.

Mashad and the Khorasan Weaving Tradition

Mashad sits in Khorasan in northeast Persia, a pilgrimage city whose workshops have supplied room-size rugs for generations and whose weavers borrowed freely from the great central Persian design books, including the Sarouk medallion seen here. Khorasan wool is long stapled and takes dye deeply, which is why Mashad reds hold their saturation and why the pile keeps its sheen under traffic instead of going chalky. Construction is workshop rather than village: a double weft cotton foundation, an even knot count across the full 12 foot length, and straight selvages with no drift in the border lines, all visible in the reverse shown in photograph 5. This is the kind of weave that earns its keep in a busy room, dense enough to hold the fine floral drawing and tough enough to live under a dining table or a full seating arrangement for another lifetime.