How Oriental Rugs Are Made

The design of an Oriental rug is the first element to be created. The artist conceives a theme he or she wants to represent. The design is then coded on a graph-like paper called a Talim, creating a blueprint for every minute detail of the rug, including colors.

The raw material for an Oriental rug is the fiber, made from wool, cotton and occasionally silk. Before the weaving process starts, raw wool is taken from the sheep, camel or goat and processed into yarn. This requires a series of intricate procedures including cleaning, carding, spinning and plying. The yarn is then immersed in dye. The absorption of the dye is influenced by many factors, such as the quality of the wool, the concentration of the dye, the length of time the yarn is left immersed in the dye and the type of spring water used. In the final stage the yarn is washed to remove excess dye and hung out to dry. Originally, dyes were made from herbs, roots, animal extracts and minerals. These natural vegetable dyes produce beautiful uneven colors, with multiple and changing hues. However, the color palette is limited. In the later part of the 19th century synthetic dyes were introduced, resulting in uniform hues and a near limitless color palette.

After the yarn has been prepared, the weaving process can begin. Oriental rugs are the only textiles used in the same form as they leave the loom. There are two basic types of Oriental rugs, flat-weave and pile rugs. Both types are woven on a loom. Pile rugs add hand knotted yarn to the woven fabric producing a structure similar to animal fleece.

Flat-Weave Rugs

On the loom several lines of undyed fiber, usually cotton, are fastened vertically at equally spaced intervals. The closer the spacing, the finer the rug will be. These vertical strings are known as warp. The warp creates one element of the weave and constitutes the foundation of the rug itself. Following the blueprint for the design, the weaver passes dyed yarn horizontally over and under the warps line after line, creating the design. The horizontal lines are known as weft, and constitute the other element of the weave.

Pile-Rugs

Pile rugs are made by the combined procedures of weaving and knotting. After several lines of weft are completed, the knotting starts. The weaver makes a loop of yarn and pulling two warp threads at a time ties a knot on to them. This process is repeated across the width of the rug. Thousands of knots conceal the warp yarn or foundation and create a thick fuzzy, light-reactive pile. Once a line of knots is completed, one or several rows of wefts are once again woven across the rug and beaten down with a special tool known as a comb to make the fabric solid and compact. The pattern is obtained by changing the color of the pile yarn. Once a considerable area is knotted, the loops are cut to the desired height revealing the design. The thickness of the pile varies according to the type of rug. The floral rugs have a shorter pile, geometric and nomadic rugs have a higher one.

After the whole design has been woven, the Oriental carpet is cut from the warp threads which affix it to the loom, leaving several inches of non-woven warp attached at each end, which become the fringes of the carpet. Finally the edges are made by passing a needle with yarn to conceal the warp threads.

Weaving pile rugs requires a great quantity of wool and an enormous amount of labor. Because of this, pile rugs command a high price. The rugs of greatest artistic value and historical importance have all been pile rugs.

Knots

The fineness of the weave is measured by the number of knots per square inch (or per square decimeter). This is itself determined primarily by the weight and spacing of the warps, secondarily by the weight and spacing of the wefts and finally by the thickness of the pile yarn. The knot count ranges from 80 knots per square inch for loosely woven tribal rugs, to the 24,000 knots per square inch found in the Mughal prayer rug from Northern India. It is important to remember that the number of knots per square inch is only one of several criteria for evaluating a rug. There are many ways to tie a knot, and as is often the case with other elements of Oriental rugs, the type of knot varies from region to region. The best known knots are the symmetrical Gheordes or Turkish knot and the two forms of asymmetrical Senna or Persian knot.

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