9'10" x 13'4" Persian Kashan Rug | Red Floral Medallion | Signed Cartouche

This is a true room-size piece at 9'10" x 13'4", hand-knotted in central Persia on a cotton foundation with a dense wool pile that still stands full and even across the whole field. The weaver signed the work in a small woven cartouche set into the end border, which is the mark of a named workshop rather than an anonymous commercial run, and it is the first thing worth looking at on the photographs. Among Persian Kashan rugs this is the classic formula done properly: red ground, navy lobed medallion, ivory corner spandrels, and drawing that stays crisp from the medallion out to the guard stripes. If you are shopping 10x13 Persian rugs, this one covers a large seating area without the field reading as empty. A certificate of authenticity ships with the rug.

Design and Motifs

The center holds a stepped, lobed medallion with an ivory core, built around a single red rosette ringed by sky blue leaves and small red and blue blossoms. That core sits inside a navy surround filled with palmettes, tulip forms and paired serrated leaves, and the medallion finishes at both ends in slender navy pendants topped with a cypress-like finial. Four corner spandrels in navy and ivory repeat the same vocabulary in quarter form. Between them the red field carries an all-over curvilinear system of vine scroll, rosettes, palmettes and split leaves, drawn loose enough to breathe but continuous enough that the eye never finds a gap. The main border is a navy rosette-and-vine band, flanked on each side by light blue guard stripes and then by narrower ivory and red minor guards, so the frame builds in five distinct steps before the field begins.

Reading the Color

The ground is a clear madder red, warm rather than orange, and it holds the same tone from selvage to selvage with only the gentle abrash you expect from hand-dyed wool. Against it the navy of the medallion, spandrels and main border reads almost black in shadow and clearly blue in direct light, which is what gives the rug its depth in a room. The relief comes from the secondary palette: a soft sky blue in the guard stripes and leaf work, ivory in the medallion core and corner grounds, sage and olive green in the vine stems, muted gold in the minor guards, and small touches of rose and brown scattered through the blossoms. Ivory outlining around the medallion and each spandrel keeps those shapes legible against the red, and the wool takes light well enough that the field shifts a shade as you walk past it.

Kashan, and Why the Weave Matters

Kashan sits in central Persia north of Isfahan and has been a weaving town since the Safavid court workshops, which is where this curvilinear medallion layout comes from. The local wool is soft and lustrous, and Kashan weavers work it at a knot count high enough to carry a fully curved line, which is the whole point of the design: a coarser weave turns these vines into steps. Look at the back in the close-up and the knotting is tight and regular, the rows straight, the pattern legible from the reverse, all signs of a workshop loom rather than village work. This is also the most recognizable Persian design in America, and if you watch Shark Tank there is a Persian Kashan on the floor. A signed example in excellent condition at this size is not a common thing to find.