9'8" x 12'9" Persian Kerman Rug | Signed Floral Medallion | Red Field, Soft Blue Spandrels

This is a formal, room-filling piece from the workshops of southeast Persia, and it reads that way the moment it is rolled out: a deep madder red field, an enormous tiered medallion drawn in soft blue and ivory, and a navy border packed with rosettes and turning vine. The weaver signed the rug in a small cartouche at the top of the ivory inner border, which is a workshop habit rather than a village one and tells you the drawing was worked from a proper cartoon. It is hand-knotted in wool on a cotton foundation with a low, even 3/8" pile, so the pattern stays crisp and the rug lies flat without bulk under furniture. It sits in the same footprint as our other 10x13 Persian rugs and arrives with a certificate of authenticity recording origin, materials and measurements.

Design and Motifs

The centre of the rug is built outward from a single small rose: around it sit a green and ivory star, then a ring of lanceolate petals in blue and rose, then a beige band of tiny blossoms, then a navy ring set with palmettes and cypress-like cones, and finally a serrated blue outline that throws points into the red ground. Above and below the medallion the drawing continues into flowering pendants, and the open red field is filled with delicate vine work carrying small round rosettes and leaf sprays rather than left bare. All 4 corners carry big soft blue spandrels, each one holding a large paisley cone outlined in ivory and filled with its own miniature garden. The border scheme runs in bands: narrow floral guard stripes, a wide beige and blue meander of blossoms, and a navy main border where a serpentine vine links rosette after rosette right around the rug.

A Deep Red Ground Cooled by Blue and Ivory

The field is a true madder red, warm and slightly brick rather than orange, and it carries the whole composition. Against it the weaver has set a powdery cornflower blue that does most of the cooling work, appearing in the medallion tiers, the corner spandrels and the vine of the main border. Ivory and soft beige act as the outline colour throughout, drawing every petal and cone so the pattern stays readable from standing height, while a deep navy anchors the outer border and the ring inside the medallion. Look closer and the smaller notes come out: rose pink and clean white blossoms, small touches of sage and bottle green in the leaves, and thin saffron gold lines separating the border bands. The overall effect is the classic balance collectors look for in red and burgundy Persian rugs, rich on the floor but never loud, and easy to live with alongside walnut, cream upholstery and antique brass.

Kerman Weaving in Southeast Persia

Kerman lies in the arid southeast of Persia and has one of the longest unbroken workshop traditions in the country, built on professional designers, master dyers and weavers who worked to a drawn cartoon rather than from memory. That system is what allows the curved line and the tight floral detail you see here, since a medallion of this complexity cannot be improvised at the loom. Kerman is best known for its pictorial and garden borders, but the formal medallion and corner layout, drawn fine and outlined in ivory, is the house style for a room-size piece like this one. The back shows a regular, close weave with no slack rows, and the wool has kept a soft handle and a quiet sheen, both signs of good local fleece and careful clipping. Signed, in excellent condition and still even across the full 9'8" x 12'9", it is a piece bought once for a main room and kept.