Antique Spanish Carpet with Pattern of Renaissance Palmettes

The old ivory-yellow field supports an all-over pattern of half-drop rows of golden, skeletal flowering plants including tulips and poppies. The orange-rust border features an undula...

This coarsely knotted piece shows a colorful rose wreath on the sand ground. Additional roses decorate the teal inner border. Detail tones include lemon, goldenrod,off white, red, me...

The court workshop called 'Real Fabrica de Tapices' has been active in Madrid since the 17th century, supplying handmade carpets woven with Turkish (symmetrical) knots to both the court as well as for export. Throughout the 20th century their carpets were either woven with French Savonnerie patterns or, as in this case, with designs taken from the Spanish Renaissance weaving tradition. These carpets are known in the trade with the term of 'Cuenca,' which is the city in southern Spain where they were originally woven in the 15th-17th centuries. Here the pattern, which has a raised pile with respect to the ivory background, is distinguished by an infinite repeat of curvilinear palmettes as seen on 15th-16th century Spanish Alcaraz carpets.

Under the direction of Pierre Dupont and Simon Lourdet carpet production commenced in France in the early 17th Century. In 1608, a workshop was set up in the Louvre, followed by the ...