9'9" x 11'7" Persian Kashan Rug | Signed Floral Medallion | 1980s, Perfect Condition

This is a signed 1980s piece from the classical tradition of Persian Kashan rugs, hand-knotted in natural wool on a cotton foundation and measuring 9'9" x 11'7". The weaver put his name in a small ivory cartouche at one end of the field, which in Persian weaving is a workshop statement rather than decoration. The pile is full and even across the whole surface, the sides and ends are original, and the drawing is the formal court format: one lobed navy medallion on a burgundy field, four matching corner spandrels, and a wide navy main border between ivory guard stripes. It ships with a certificate of authenticity, and at this footprint it sits comfortably in the large Persian rug range for a full seating group.

Design and Motifs

The center holds a lobed navy medallion with a small ivory cartouche at its heart, and inside that an 8 petal rosette in blue, rose and green outlined in gold. Sky blue pendants rise and fall from the top and bottom of the medallion, and long curling acanthus leaves push outward into the field like spray from a fountain. The field itself is not a repeating lattice but a balanced arrangement of flowering sprays, palmettes and cypress-like leaf clusters, each one drawn with a curved line rather than a stepped one, mirrored top to bottom and side to side. The 4 corner spandrels repeat the navy of the medallion and carry the same ivory and blue vinework, so the eye reads the whole field as one composition. The main border is a navy ground carrying alternating rosettes and palmettes joined by a continuous vine, with small red cartouches at the corners, and it is held between two ivory guard borders of the same flowering vine at a smaller scale. A narrow sky blue stripe separates field from border and keeps the two dark grounds from collapsing into each other.

The Burgundy, Navy and Ivory Palette

Two strong colors carry the rug. The field is a burgundy that leans rose where the light hits the pile and goes to a deep wine where it lies flat, the kind of madder-family red that changes through the day rather than sitting still. Against it the medallion, spandrels and main border are a very dark navy, close to indigo black in the shadows, which is what makes the burgundy read as warm rather than heavy. The detail work supplies everything else: ivory and buttery cream in the flower heads and guard borders, a clear sky blue in the leaves and the medallion core, a deeper mid blue in the vines, soft rose pink in the small blossoms, and touches of olive and bottle green in the leaf tips. Gold and apricot appear in the medallion outlines and in the red cartouches set into the border corners. There is no white in the field, only ivory, so the contrast stays soft. The end panel where the signature sits is plain red, which lets the pale script show clearly against it.

Kashan Weaving and the Signed Cartouche

Kashan sits in central Persia, north of Isfahan, and its looms have worked in the Safavid court workshop tradition for centuries: a red field, a lobed medallion, ivory spandrels and a curvilinear vine that only holds together at a serious knot count. This is the format most Americans have seen without knowing its name, since when you watch Shark Tank there is a Persian Kashan on the floor. The wool here is the soft lustrous type the region is known for, and the back photograph shows regular, tightly packed rows with the design reading as clearly from the reverse as from the face, which is the honest test of a workshop weave. The signature cartouche at one end tells you this came off a named loom rather than an anonymous one, and it is the reason a piece like this holds its value in the secondary market. At 9'9" x 11'7" with full pile and original ends, it is a formal rug that has been cared for and has decades of use left in it.