9'10" x 12'7" Persian Mashad Rug | Red Field, Ivory Star Medallion | Semi Antique Khorasan Weave

This is a classic room-size Mashad in the format collectors look for first: a warm tomato-red open field, a single commanding medallion, and borders that frame rather than compete. It measures 9'10" x 12'7", which places it squarely among 10x13 Persian rugs, the size that settles a full seating group without crowding the walls. The wool pile stands at 3/8" and is even from end to end, the selvedges are intact, and the ivory fringe is original and unshortened, as the end photograph shows. Several decades of age have taken the red down from new-dye sharpness to a mellow glow, the quality that makes semi antique Persian Mashad rugs so easy to live with. Every rug we sell ships with a certificate of authenticity recording origin, materials and measurements.

Design and Motifs

The center holds a wide lobed medallion built outward from an 8 petal rosette on ivory, ringed by stepped cartouches, small cypress forms and square panels that read almost like tilework when you look at the close-up. Above and below it, slender pendants drop into the open field and finish in tiny blossoming sprays, a device Mashad weavers use to stretch the composition along the length of the rug. The red ground is not empty: fine curling vines, split palmettes and scattered rosettes drift across it at low density, so the eye still goes to the medallion first. All 4 corners carry deep navy spandrels packed with arabesque scroll and large serrated leaves, and their inner edges are outlined in ivory to sharpen the break against the field. The border system runs 5 bands deep, a navy main border of alternating palmettes and rosettes set between a camel floral band and narrow ivory guard stripes of running vine.

A Closer Look at the Color

The field is a warm tomato red with an orange cast under daylight and a deeper brick tone under lamplight, which is why the flat studio shot and the warehouse floor shots read slightly differently. Against it, the corner spandrels and main border are a dark indigo navy, almost black where the pile turns away from the light. The medallion center is ivory to pale cream and carries the detail work: coral, soft rose, terracotta, mid blue, and small flecks of true green in the leaf tips and guard stripes. A camel to light brown secondary border, visible clearly in the corner photograph, supplies the one note of warmth that keeps the navy from going heavy, and it is drawn with ivory and blue blossoms on a fine dark vine. Outermost is a plain red edge band. Red, ivory and multi-color is the honest summary, and the combination suits rooms with wood floors, cream or warm white walls, and dark furniture.

Mashad and the Weaving of Khorasan

Mashad sits in Khorasan, in the northeast corner of Persia, and it is the region's weaving capital as well as its largest city. Khorasan wool is long stapled and takes dye deeply, which is exactly why Mashad reds age into the soft, slightly smoky tone seen here rather than going flat. The town's workshops built their reputation on large formats, curvilinear medallion drawing and the heavy, firm handle that comes from a tight cotton foundation and a well packed wool pile. This piece shows that school clearly: the medallion is laid out symmetrically along both axes, the curved vine work in the spandrels stays fluid at scale, and the back of the rug, visible in the final photograph, shows a regular close knotted weave with no slubs or drawn-in rows. It is a dealer's rug in the best sense, correctly drawn, honestly woven, and built to stay on a floor for generations.