9' x 12' Wool and Silk Oriental Rug | Tabriz Floral Design | Black Field, Burgundy Border, New

This is a new, never used hand-knotted piece measuring 9' x 12', woven in wool with silk accents on a cotton foundation and drawn in the classic Tabriz manner. The field is black, filled edge to edge with ivory and rose palmettes on fine brown vines, and it is framed by a deep burgundy main border between ivory guard stripes. The silk shows up where the light hits the vine lines and the petal tips, which is why the pattern seems to lift off the dark ground as you walk around it. If you have been comparing Persian and Oriental rugs, this is a good example of how a traditional Tabriz drawing translates into a modern workshop weave. Every rug ships with a certificate of authenticity from Rugs.net.

Design and Motifs

There is no central medallion here. Instead the weaver has run an all-over floral design across the whole field, built on a repeating lattice of thin curved vines that loop into spirals and then open into large serrated palmettes. Between the palmettes sit smaller 8 petal rosettes, half-open buds, lanceolate leaves and little sprays of 3 blossoms, all mirrored across the long axis so the field reads as one continuous pattern rather than a grid of repeats. The main border carries alternating cusped cartouches and standing palmette bouquets, and the narrow ivory guards on either side run a scrolling arabesque with tiny red and green flower heads. Look at the corners in the close-up photos: the border pattern turns cleanly at all 4 corners instead of being cut off, which is a sign the cartoon was properly resolved before the weaving started.

A Black Field with Burgundy, Ivory and Green

The ground is a saturated black that photographs almost like ink, and it does the heavy lifting in this rug: everything drawn on top of it gains contrast. The flowers themselves are worked in a warm range of ivory, cream, soft rose and dusty pink, with apricot and rust at the palmette tips and small accents of pale blue-grey in the flower centers. Olive and sage green leaves are scattered through the vinework and keep the palette from going purely warm. The main border is a deep burgundy, closer to oxblood than to bright red, and it is separated from the field and from the outer edge by two ivory guard bands that read as pale cream against the darker tones. Selvages are finished dark to match the field, and the fringes are natural ivory cotton. In a room this reads as a dark, formal floor with a lot of light detail in it.

Origin and Weaving Quality

This rug was made in China, in a workshop weaving to the Tabriz drawing tradition, and it is honest work: hand-knotted knot by knot on a cotton warp and weft, with wool pile lifted by silk in the vines and highlights. The back, shown in the detail photograph, is even and tightly packed, the knot rows are straight, and the pile has been clipped low so the curved lines of the vinework stay crisp rather than blurring. Wool and silk together give you two different surfaces in one rug, a matte body and a reflective line, which is the whole point of the technique. At 9' x 12' it is a full room size, and you can see the rest of our 9x12 rugs if you want to compare colorways at the same footprint.