Manhattan - Turkish Rugs

An antique Turkish Oushak large room size carpet in square format handmade during the early 20th century. The tone-on-tone design incorporates a gold background with only light sketc...

A vintage Turkish flatweave Kilim room size carpet handmade during the mid-20th century. Measures: 10' 1" x 13' 2".

Pillow made from an early 20th century turkish rug. poly fill insert provided with a zipper closure 16'' x 16''

A modern Turkish large carpet with tassels and braided fringes. Handmade during the 21st century, this carpet is inspired by vintage Moroccan carpets from the Mid-20th Century period...

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A vintage Turkish flatweave Kilim room size carpet handmade during the mid-20th century. Measures: 9' 2" x 12' 0".

A vintage Turkish Anatolian tribal room size carpet handmade during the mid-20th century. Measures: 9' 1" x 15' 3".

A vintage Turkish flatweave Kilim throw rug handmade during the mid-20th century in white. Measures: 3' 0" x 5' 11"

A vintage Turkish Sivas deco carpet from the mid-20th century. Measures: 6' 5" x 9' 7".

How rare is an old gold field? A geometric version of the all-over Harshang (crab) pattern is symmetrically laid out with accents in goldenrod, ecru and salmon, all on the abrashed g...

Anatolian rugs originated from Anatolia, also referred to as Asian Turkey, due to its geographical location. They are hand knotted, pile rugs made of natural fibers and dyes. Many of...

One of a Kind Vintage Turkish Konya Rug Details rug no. y1673 size 1' 6" x 2' 7" (46 x 79 cm)

An early 20th century Turkish Sivas. Sivas is a city in North Central Turkey, which is a major production site of Turkish rugs based on Persian designs. Often finely woven, Sivas rug...

An antique Turkish silk Kayseri carpet from the second quarter of the 20th century.

A vintage Turkish Anatolian rug from the mid-20th century. Measures: 2' 2" x 3' 1"

The Mid-Century Modern Collection is skillfully sourced by N A S I R I and exclusive to our showroom. These flatweaves embody the minimalist sophistication that emerged in the mid-20...

The peach field displays a centrally positioned spacious design of rough palmettes and fringed acanthus leaves, accented in goldenrod, pale tangerine, rust and green. Pale pink borde...

Anatolian rugs originated from Anatolia, also referred to as Asian Turkey, due to its geographical location. They are hand knotted, pile rugs made of natural fibers and dyes. Many of...

Pillow made from a vintage Turkish Anatolian rug. 16'' x 18''

a late 19th-century Turkish Hereke worn rug in moss green and raspberry tones Details rug no. 31621 size 5' 2" x 8' 1" (157 x 246 cm)

An antique Turkish Oushak rug in runner format handmade during the early 20th century. Measures: 2' 8" x 10' 9" Turkish rugs & carpets: Until the Great Persian Carpet Revival in the later 19th century, the “Oriental rug” was Turkish. For nearly six centuries, Turkish rugs, both scatter, room size, and even larger, thoroughly dominated the European import market. Whereas the Persian carpet can be divided into urban, village, and tribal types, in Turkey and its predecessor the Ottoman Empire, rugs almost exclusively came from village weavers and from a small number of urban workshops. Ninety percent village, nine percent city, one percent tribal. Turkish weavers have, with very few exceptions, always worked with the symmetric (Turkish) knot. Wool foundations are standard practice among both town and village weavers. The exceptions, very finely woven 20th century and recent Herekeh silks from near Istanbul, and early 17th century Ottoman Court rugs from Bursa, constitute only a tiny part of the total. Always pricey, they appealed and still appeal to the clients who want lots of knots and perfect execution instead of individual personality. The urban workshops have been centered around the western Turkish city of Oushak and its attendant port town of Smyrna. Oushak weaves with the trends in fashion. When color saturated medallion carpets were needed, Oushak was ready in the 17th and 18th centuries. When coarse red and blue carpets were required, Oushak and Smyrna in the 19th century wove them by the boatload. When tastes changed again, and the European dealers in Smyrna wanted room size carpets with lighter and unusual colors, and with Persianate designs, production ramped up in nearby Oushak. Those antique, all-wool construction turn-of-the-century carpets are still in high demand with designers. Antique carpets with allover, roughly drawn patterns on grounds of shrimp, rust, straw, cream, pale blue, and pale and pea green, hitherto unavailable colors, are in such demand today that contemporary Oushaks have attempted to mimic them with soft palettes, extra-large scale drawing and coarse weaves. Oushaks woven for the Turkish market, for palaces, houses and mosques were often oversize with large, repeating medallions, all in shades of (Turkey) red, dark blue, light blue-teal, and ivory, with lemon and green accents. Turkey, along with India, invented standard sizes. By vertically repeating the medallion, one could get one medallion, one with two end halves, two, three, etc. medallions, up to thirty or so feet in length. The process spared making new cartoons for each length and allowed a quicker turnaround time. Oushak, from the time of 15th century “Holbein” rugs onward, has always been a commercial center. The prayer niche directional rug is primarily a Turkish development. In the towns and villages east of Oushak, in Ghiordes, Kula, Ladik, Kirsehir, Mucur and Konya, among others, arch pattern scatters with bright palettes and weaves varying from relatively fine to moderate were almost the entire production. Antique examples were particularly popular in America around 1900. Other centers of village weaving were situated on the western coast and adjacent islands with the town of Melas and neighboring villages weaving geometric prayer rugs and scatters with a characteristic khaki green and lots of yellow. The other large region was in the northwest of Anatolia, near ancient Troy, with the sizable town of Bergama at its center. The satellite towns of Ezine, Karakecilli, Yuntdag, and Canakkale all wove colorful scatters with moderate weaves in all wool with geometric designs and cheerful palettes. Near to Istanbul, these were among the first Turkish rugs to reach Europe in the Renaissance. The earliest Turkish pieces depicted in Italian Old Master paintings display the so-called “Memling gul”, an allover panel pattern with hooked and stepped elements within the reserves. This pattern continues for centuries in the Konya area and in the Caucasus as well. Turkey is a land of villages and much of the most interesting Turkish weaving comes from one undiscovered village or another. The Konya-Cappadocia region of central Turkey includes the active towns of Karapinar, Karaman, Obruk, Sizma, and Tashpinar, all weaving Konya-esque scatters and long rugs. Karapinar has been active the longest, since the 17th century. The mosques in and around Konya have preserved locally-made rugs from the fourteenth. In the 20th century, the extra-long pile, many wefted Tulu rug was devised, with limited palettes and color block patterns. These are not really antique Tulus, but they must be a product of long-standing village tradition. There are thousands upon thousands of rural Turkish villages, almost all with easy access to local tribal wool. Rug students are discovering new names and rug types almost daily. The common denominators are bright colors, geometric designs, wool construction, moderate to coarse weaves and symmetric knots. Synthetic dyes hit the Turkish rug industry quickly and hard after 1870, and they penetrated to even the most off-the-beaten-track villages. This development was almost entirely negative. The village weavers used fugitive or overly bright dyes which ruined the color harmonies built up over centuries. Characteristic types disappeared or were negatively transmuted. The Turkish village rug of the 1870 to 1920 period is nothing to be proud of. In the eastern provinces, the semi-nomadic Kurdish tribes, collectively called ‘Yuruks’, weave all wool, geometric pieces with medium to medium-coarse weaves, as well as kilims and other flatweaves. The rugs employ cochineal instead of madder for the reds, mustard yellows, greens, and various blues. They are under-collected like the Persian Afshars. Their rugs are in scatter and long rug formats. The far eastern Turkish town of Erzerum has a long tradition of idiosyncratic, semi-workshop rugs and further to the east is Kars with a tradition of rugs in the Caucasian Kazak manner. One Turkish specialty is the Yastiks or cushion cover, made in pairs for the public living rooms of village houses. These are larger rugs in miniature and good ones are highly collectible. Like other Turkish rustic weavings, ones with synthetic dyes are almost totally undesirable. Only the tribal Baluch make similar cushion covers, known as pushtis or balishts, in the same small, oblong format. Yastiks always have a back, usually in plain weave, so that they can be easily stuffed. When the Imperial Carpet Factory at Herekeh near Istanbul closed in the early 20th century, the highly proficient Armenian master weavers set up in the Kum Kapi district of Istanbul where they wove all-silk, exquisitely fine and elaborately detailed small pieces, sometimes enriched with metal thread, for the most discriminating European buyers. Today the best, signed Kum Kapi pieces, usually in the “Sultan’s head” prayer niche design, can fetch upwards of $100,000. They are strictly for the wall. An Interwar all-silk room size Kum Kapi carpet is both exceedingly rare and stratospherically priced. The workshops closed in the 1930s, but the weaving of extremely fine, all-silk small rugs in Herekeh was revived in the 1960s. There has been a recent vogue for larger Turkish village vintage...

A modern Turkish flatweave Kilim room size carpet handmade during the 21st century. Measures: 11' 2" x 14' 2".

A contemporary Turkish large room size carpet handmade during the 21st century inspired by Moroccan carpets from the mid-20th century period. Measures: 13' 9" x 16' 2".

This antique Turkish Oushak rug is an exceptional and dynamic example in very good condition for its age. Made in the late 19th century. With colors that reflect the Arts and Craft...

A contemporary Turkish flatweave Kilim large room size carpet handmade during the 21st century in shades of cream and black. This patchwork style rug consists of hand-weaving togethe...

Rare Antique Turkish Oushak Pink Rose Rug 10x12 Rug 9'7" x 11'4" 9 x 12 300cm x 345cm Circa 1870 "This is a stunning, rare antique 1870'S T...

A modern Turkish room size carpet handmade during the 21st century with a braided design in white and grey. Measures: 9' 0" x 12' 4".

A vintage Turkish flat-weave Kilim small room size carpet handmade during the mid-20th century in shades of red orange. Measures: 7' 10" x 11' 0" Knotted pile rugs are just one...

A vintage Turkish flat-weave Kilim room size carpet handmade during the mid-20th century in shades of white. Measures: 9' 1" x 13' 10" Flat-weave Rugs & Carpets: Knotted pile ...

A five column all-over pattern of particularly ragged fat palmettes and gnarled leaf lozenges decorates the abrashed light redfield of this all-wool west Anatolian antique. Creamy st...

An early 20th century Turkish Melas Runner Details rug no. 31700 size 3' 3" x 11' 6" (99 x 351 cm)

A vintage Turkish flat-weave Kilim room size carpet handmade during the mid-20th century. Measures: 10' 7" x 13' 7" Flat-weave rugs & carpets: Knotted pile rugs are just one small part of a vast universe of textile techniques suitable for heavy use. If you can imagine it, some weaver has tried it out. Pieces can be roughly divided into those reversible from the start and those never, or at least not initially, reversible. Thus, kilims are considered reversible, while everything else is not. Kilims are tapestry woven rugs with both sides the same, in either slit technique where colors change, or with various methods of avoiding slits. Slit tapestry weave goes back to ancient times and Coptic Egyptian weavers used it for ornaments on garments and larger wall hangings. Slits can be avoided by dovetailing of colors (warp sharing) or by interlocking the wefts. The Navajo weavers of the Southwest practice the first while the fine shawl weavers of Kashmir and Kerman employed the second. Interlocking produces a one-faced fabric, with smooth and rough, ridged faces. The typical Turkish, Caucasian, or Persian rustic kilim shows slits, but never long ones. Aubusson French carpets are also slit tapestries and the long color transitions are sewn up as part of the regular maintenance. Some kilims are very fine. The best antique urban Sehna (Senna) kilims on wool, cotton or silk warps approximate the comparable rugs in refinement and are the most desirable of all Persian kilims. Although the various flatweave techniques are usually expressed in geometric, simple, often repeating, patterns, Sehna kilims demonstrate that even the most intricate designs can be effectively rendered in flat-stich. The term ‘kilim’ has been extended to cover any pileless, weft-faced heavy textile. Thus, the sectioned and joined northeastern Persian horizontally striped wool rugs are called ‘kilims’. So are the plain-weave end finishes of pile rugs. All these are weft-faced, weft patterned flatweaves. These sectioned pieces are woven not on a frame loom, but one steadied by the weaver at one end and with the warps fastened down at the other. Only relatively recent have these tribal pieces become available. They are used as floorcoverings, hangings, room dividers, furniture covers. They are mostly bitonal in shades of natural dark brown and beige. Some more recent pieces show weaver innovations with ikat and moire effects. Work proceeds quickly and a skilled weaver can complete a thirty foot strip in almost no time. Wefts, the elements added as weaving progresses, play an essential part in what is a flatweave. The best-known example of an extra-weft, wrapping technique is on Caucasian and tribal Persian Soumaks, where a pattern weft wraps around the fixed warp, changing as weaving progresses. Soumaks can be large carpets, Kuba in the Caucasus, small bag faces (Caucasian and Persian Shah Savan saddle bags), or cover scatter rugs (Persian Afshars). The Soumak technique is fast, and a weaver can work much more quickly than tying knots. The left-over wefts are cut off on the back, so the front and back are initially different. As a Soumak on the floor gets used, these weft yarns wear away and the two sides converge although the exact texture remains distinct. There are other ways of pattern by weft. Often on smaller tribal pieces, the pattern weft(s) is (are) part of the weft structure, moving in an out, and holding the whole thing together. These wefts can be complementary or added (supplementary), continuous across the flatweave or cut off as they travel unneeded across the verso. Supplementary weft flatweaves are often very compact and substantial. The nomadic Turkmen and Balouch tribes employ both supplementary and complementary weft techniques on their pieces. Supplementary wefts are often raised on the recto (front) while complementary wefts are flat to the surface. Tribal Kurds employ this extra-wefting technique. The Balouch of Pakistan use complementary wefts almost exclusively on their small woven paraphernalia like salt bags. Flatweave techniques may be combined on a single piece. Afshar rugs employ plain-weave end strips, preceded by Soumak bands, with pile sections between. The large Bakhtiari saddlebags feature Soumak work, pile “islands” an areas of plain-weave. Qashqai rugs and kilims frequently displays checkerboard end strips in continuous, complementary wefting. Another distinct flatweave type is the jajim (jijim, cecim) in which a pattern is added with colored wefts as the weaving of the plain-weave ground progresses. Here the wefts are discontinuous and the pattern stands proud from the voided ground. Often made in two pieces on narrow looms and edge-sewn together, these may have geometric patterns. The term ‘jajim’ also refers to the assembled warp-faced strip and stripe covers from the Shah Savan of northwest Persia, the pattern is defined by warps alone, usually in plain stripes, but sometimes in designs of ladders, snakes, human figures and various animals. Here the color changing warps are continuous. Most are wool, a few are silk. Better to call these something else. Indian ‘Dhurries’ are all cotton kilims and ‘shatrangis’ employ wool wefts on cotton warps. Dhurries are slitless. The cotton texture is more appropriate to the humid and warm climate of the Indian subcontinent. Modern Dhurries...

A vintage Turkish Sparta rug that has been overdyed teal with hand-knotted raised piles to form the 'pseudo' medallion, spandrels, and border of this modern folk piece.

A vintage Turkish Anatolian square room size carpet handmade during the mid-20th century with a large scale tribal design over a solid orange background with light and dark striation...

A vintage Turkish flat-weave Kilim accent rug handmade during the mid-20th century made up of 3 columns with several horizontal variating shades of color in grey (gray), white, and c...

Vintage Turkish Oushak Runner Rug 5'3 X 10'11. These attractive rugs are suitable for a wide variety of places, but the significant effect of Oushaks is that they bring space togethe...

A vintage Turkish flatweave Kilim room size carpet handmade during the mid-20th century. Measures: 9' 11" x 13' 3".

A modern Turkish flat-weave Kilim room size rug handmade during the 21st century with a colorful horizontal pattern. A statement piece with its bright and whimsical colors. Measur...

Mid-20th Century turkish rug depicting 2 deers on a brown field Measures: 2'1" x 2'9''.

A modern Turkish large room size carpet handmade during the 21st century inspired by Moroccan rugs of the mid-20th century period. Measures: 14' 2" x 18' 8".

A vintage Turkish flat-weave Kilim throw rug handmade during the mid-20th century with a tribal design. Measures: 3' 6" x 5' 0" Flat-weave Rugs & Carpets: Knotted pile rugs ar...

A vintage Turkish Anatolian throw rug handmade during the mid-20th century. Measures: 3' 4" x 6' 7".

An antique Turkish Oushak gallery carpet handmade during the early 20th century. Measures: 7' 0" x 13' 3".

Vintage Turkish Oushak Rug 3'3 X 6'3. The central Abrash (color change) in the field gives this rug a wonderful look and feel. Abrash is a color change that normally occurs when the ...

A modern Turkish flat-weave Kilim large room size carpet handmade during the 21st century with a colorful horizontally striped pattern. A statement piece with its bright and whimsica...

Vintage Turkish Oushak Rug 4'1 X 7'4. The luxurious quality of the wool (for which Oushaks have always been famous) contributed to the vibrancy of the colors. Unlike most Turkish rugs, Oushak rugs were heavily influenced by Persian design. Many depictions of ancient oriental carpets in old western paintings...

Antique Moroccan Rug, circa 1920, Room size. A one-of-a-kind antique Moroccan Rug, hand-knotted with medium thickness wool pile. This beautiful rug features a central medallion d...

A vintage Turkish Anatolian room size rug handmade during the mid-20th century. Very much in the style of mid-century modern with its elongated whimsical oval pattern belonging to the period of the atomic art...

Late 19th Century Turkish Oushak Carpet ( 11'4" x 13' - 345 x 395 )

A modern Turkish Kilim from the 21st century. The rug consists of a vintage hemp Kilim as the white background and raised patches to form the design. No borders, but a finely abrashe...

A vintage Turkish Oushak carpet from the second quarter of the 20th century featuring a minimalistic solid orange ground encased by a single border.

A one of a kind Turkish scatter size throw rug from the mid-20th century.

A vintage Turkish Anatolian rug from the second half of the 20th century. Measures: 2' 11" x 6' 2"

An antique Turkish Oushak large room size carpet in square format handmade during the early 20th century. Measures: 13' 1" x 14' 7".

A modern Turkish Anatolian room size carpet handmade during the 21st century. This contemporary borderless Turkish rug features 7 leafy vines over an aubergine (eggplant) purple colo...

A contemporary Turkish flatweave Kilim accent rug handmade during the 21st century inspired by Swedish Kilim carpets from the mid-20th century period. Measures: 6' 3" x 9' 4".

A vintage Turkish flat-weave Kilim accent rug handmade during the mid-20th century with 4 columns of offset stripes in cream and sienna. Measures: 6' ...

Square Shape Mid-Century Modern Design Geometric Earthy Tones Rug, Country of origin: Turkey, Circa date: Modern