9'9" x 13'9" Wool Oriental Rug | Mahi Tabriz Fish Design | Burgundy & Ivory | Never Used

This 9'9" x 13'9" hand-knotted Oriental rug was woven in China in the classic Mahi Tabriz drawing, with a 3/8" wool pile on a cotton foundation and a finish tight enough that the back reads almost like graph paper. It has never been on a floor: the pile stands straight, the burgundy is unwalked and the ivory fringe is still bright white. At just under 10 by 14 feet it covers a full seating group or a 10 seat dining table, and it is one of the easiest pieces we sell to live with, because the field reads as quiet pattern rather than as a single loud statement. Every rug leaves us with a certificate of authenticity confirming it is genuinely hand-knotted, along with the measurements, materials and origin recorded here.

Design and Motifs

Mahi means fish, and the whole field is built from the Herati unit: a small rosette inside a diamond lattice, flanked by 4 curved leaves that early weavers read as fish circling a pool. Here that all-over Herati lattice runs edge to edge without a break, shrinking to a very small repeat so the surface has the grain of woven cloth rather than of separate motifs. Over it sits a stepped, lobed diamond medallion with a pointed ivory center, a pair of slender pendants top and bottom, and 4 corner spandrels that echo the medallion outline against the lighter ground. The main border carries linked palmettes and serrated leaves on a burgundy ground, framed inside and out by ivory guard stripes of small boteh, the paisley teardrop that appears again in the reverse photo. The drawing is symmetrical on both axes, so the rug looks correct from every side of the room.

A Burgundy, Ivory and Green Color Story

The dominant color is a deep burgundy, closer to aged wine than to fire red, and it holds both the inner field around the medallion and the main border, which is what gives the rug its weight from across a room. Against it the ivory reads warm rather than stark: the spandrels and the medallion center sit in a soft cream that shifts toward tan and pale rose where the light catches the wool. Green appears in controlled doses, a muted sage and olive in the Herati leaves and in the border foliage, cooling the red so the palette never turns heavy. The close-up photograph shows the smaller accents that carry the design at floor level, including dusty rose rosettes, camel, charcoal outlines and tiny flecks of white that give the lattice its sparkle. The overall effect is a burgundy and cream rug that works with mahogany and walnut furniture, brass, and cream or oatmeal upholstery.

Origin and Weaving Quality

This is an honest piece of Chinese workshop weaving, made on a vertical loom by hand, knot by knot, following the Tabriz Mahi cartoon that has become one of the most copied and most successful designs in the Oriental rug trade. The back photograph, shot against a 12 inch ruler, shows the evidence: small, even, tightly packed knots, clean straight rows, no gaps and no glue, with the same detail visible from behind as from the front. Chinese ateliers building at this level use good long staple wool and a strong cotton warp and weft, which is why the pile still has body and the selvages are firm and straight. For buyers shopping 10x14 Oriental rugs, this is the practical argument: a room size hand-knotted wool rug in a court quality drawing, brand new, with decades of floor life still in front of it.