Ninety percent silk, ten percent wool, and no longer being woven
162×240 cm
Products
-
162×240 cm
-
Fine flowers on cream: pearl in raking light, pastel from above
157×243 cm
-
Black frame around a turquoise center: silk and viscose
171×243 cm
-
Gold and blue over cream: viscose, knotted in China
169×240 cm
-
Brown taken to a gloss, densely knotted, 146 × 190 cm
146×190 cm
-
Beaten hard in the Bijar manner: burgundy on a floral field
201×247 cm
-
Spun on a kirmen spindle, colored out of plant roots
162×252 cm
-
Classical drawing scaled down, not cropped: 164 × 211 cm
164×211 cm
One of a kind
Beige Anatolian-Motif Hand-Knotted Wool and Silk Rug, Sultan Series
from 122.000 TL
≈ 35.000 TL/m² -
Cocoon silk reeled whole, so the shine runs unbroken
176×252 cm
One of a kind
Cream and Green Floral Hand-Knotted Wool Rug, Sultan Series
from 156.000 TL
≈ 35.000 TL/m² -
Cream and gold at the same value, the drawing carried by sheen
172×222 cm
One of a kind
Gold and Cream Floral Hand-Knotted Wool Rug, Sultan Series
from 134.000 TL
≈ 35.000 TL/m² -
A new rug in an old rug's colors: beige wool, cocoon silk
166×241 cm
-
Flowers over the whole field, no medallion, 179 × 259 cm
179×259 cm
One of a kind
Cream Floral Hand-Knotted Wool and Silk Rug, Sultan Series
from 163.000 TL
≈ 35.000 TL/m² -
Silk warp, silk weft, silk pile: cream inside red borders
171×242 cm
-
Plain cream from the door, frames inside frames up close
123×183 cm
-
Even the fringe is silk; red field, beige drawing
218×302 cm
-
Cream ground, and knots dense enough to keep each flower apart
123×185 cm
-
Pastel blue in relief: the pile trimmed away around each motif
150×150 cm
One of a kind
Blue Oushak-Pattern Handwoven Carved Round Rug, Safir Series
from 67.500 TL
≈ 30.000 TL/m² -
Two green circles from the Oushak looms, 160 and 200 cm
200×200 cm
-
Brick-coral red, a round medallion, silk woven with viscose
200×300 cm
-
Flowers only at the corners, red taken up unevenly by old wool
158×278 cm
-
A medallion mirrored on both axes, blue and white over red
300×400 cm
-
Blue and gray where madder and gold once were: Oushak, in wool
200×300 cm
-
Beige over mink: the fine kind of Oushak drawing
250×350 cm
-
Two yellows and nothing else: 121 × 179 cm, wool on cotton
121×179 cm
A floral rug is one whose pattern is built from plant forms — palmettes, rosettes, serrated saz leaves, scrolling vine, and the tulip, carnation, rose and hyacinth of Ottoman ornament. Anatolian floral drawing is stylized rather than botanical: the flower is shown flattened and in cross-section, not observed from life.
Almost every classical Turkish pattern is floral at bottom, including many that look geometric at a distance. What follows is the actual vocabulary — the names weavers and dealers use for the parts of the drawing — and how the same flower differs between an Oushak, a Karabakh and a court rug.
The building blocks of Anatolian floral drawing
Six forms account for most of it.
- Palmette. A fan-shaped flower head, split down the middle and opened flat, descended from the lotus and honeysuckle of ancient ornament. It is the single most common floral unit in Turkish weaving, and in an Oushak it can be the size of a dinner plate.
- Rosette. A flower seen from directly above, drawn as concentric rings of petals. In Anatolian usage a rosette may be read as a rose; in Turkmen usage the word gül means a repeating octagonal tribal medallion, and no rose is intended.
- Hatayi. The Ottoman system of stylized floral forms — lotus, peony and pomegranate blossom drawn in cross-section on a continuous vine. It is the layer of the drawing that carries the flowers themselves.
- Rumi. The split-leaf arabesque that interlocks with the hatayi vine — a curling, animal-derived leaf form rather than a flower, and the layer that carries the movement.
- Saz leaf. The long, feathered, serrated leaf that sweeps across sixteenth-century Ottoman design, usually crossing a spray of rosettes. It is the most recognizable single form in Turkish court ornament.
- Islimi. The scrolling vine itself, the armature everything else hangs from. Follow it with a finger across a rug and the whole field resolves.
Above these sits the Ottoman flower quartet that appears from the middle of the sixteenth century onward and never leaves: tulip (lale), carnation (karanfil), rose (gül) and hyacinth (sümbül), often with a spring blossom branch, bahar dalı. The carnation is drawn as a fan of jagged petals, the hyacinth as a bent stem of small bells, the tulip as a single tapering cup — all of them flattened, none of them shaded.
How the same flower differs by region
The vocabulary is shared; the handwriting is not.
Oushak is the loosest and most generous. Western Anatolian weavers worked at large scale on open fields, with palmettes and cloudbands set far apart in a madder and apricot palette, and with a drawing that tolerates asymmetry. Star and medallion Oushaks put the floral units into a repeating lattice rather than a single centered design. This is the drawing European painters put under their sitters' feet in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, and it remains the most forgiving floral pattern to live with. See Oushak rugs.
Court weaving — Hereke from 1843, and the Kayseri workshops that rewove classical designs for a wider market — is the opposite: fine, curvilinear, densely drawn, and often in silk, where a higher knot count lets the saz leaf keep its serrations. Compare Hereke rugs.
Karabakh drawing brings in something from outside Anatolia altogether. Nineteenth-century Karabakh weavers took European rose bouquets from imported textiles and set them, at full size and in strong crimson and pink, on dark indigo or near-black grounds. The result is the most literally floral rug in the whole tradition, and it looks nothing like an Oushak. See Karabakh rugs.
Persian-derived patterns circulate through Anatolia as well. The herati — a rosette between two lancet leaves, repeated over the whole field — and the boteh, the almond form that became paisley, both appear in Anatolian and Bijar-style weaving. A village rug will draw them in straight lines; a workshop rug will curve them.
Floral pattern families at a glance
| Pattern family | What it looks like | Where it comes from | Typical palette |
|---|---|---|---|
| Oushak palmette and medallion | Large flower heads and cloudbands on an open field | Western Anatolia | Madder red, apricot, soft blue, ivory |
| Ottoman saz and hatayi | Serrated leaves crossing sprays of rosettes on a scrolling vine | Court workshops; Hereke, Kayseri | Crimson, deep blue, gold, ivory silk |
| Tulip, carnation and hyacinth | Named flowers drawn flat, often in a lattice or a prayer niche | Ottoman ceramic and textile design | Red, blue, green on white or cream |
| Karabakh rose bouquet | Full European roses at large scale, unstylized | South Caucasus, nineteenth century | Crimson and pink on indigo or black |
| Herati and boteh | Small repeating rosette-and-leaf, or almond forms, all over the field | Persian; widely rewoven in Anatolia | Indigo, madder, ivory, ochre |
| Millefleurs | A niche or field densely filled with many small flowers | Ottoman and Mughal prayer rugs | Ivory ground, mixed brights |
How floral rugs are made, and what that changes
Construction decides how far the drawing can bend.
A curve in a knotted rug is built out of steps, and the smaller the knot the smaller the step. That is why the finest floral drawing — the serrated saz leaf, the individual petals of a carnation — belongs to hand-knotted silk and fine wool, and why a village rug renders the same flower as a diamond with four spurs. Neither is a failure; they are different resolutions of the same idea. Hand-knotted pieces here include madder-dyed Konya Karapınar weaving, Bijar-style floral drawing, and silk Hereke and Oushak patterns.
Loom-woven rugs sit between: an even, controlled weave that holds a large floral pattern accurately at a consistent size, in wool, bamboo viscose or Tencel. Machine-woven floral rugs reproduce the same designs on a power loom at a set width and a set density, which is what makes a nine-square-meter floral rug practical for a room that gets daily use. The full logic of the three is set out in what a loom-woven rug is.
Living with a floral rug
- Plain furniture, patterned floor. A dense floral field wants quiet upholstery above it. Reverse the two and the room reads busy.
- Scale to the room. Large-drawn Oushak florals need distance to resolve; small repeating herati fields work in a corridor or a small bedroom, where they read as texture rather than as pattern.
- Pattern hides traffic. A multicolored floral field conceals soil and wear far better than a plain ground, which is why floral drawing survives in dining rooms and hallways.
- Sun. Madder and the reds fade faster than indigo, so a floral rug in a south window slowly cools. Rotate it twice a year.
The motif vocabulary carries meaning as well as decoration; Turkish rug and kilim motifs covers what the individual forms are understood to stand for.
Frequently asked questions
What is a floral rug?
A rug whose pattern is built from plant forms — palmettes, rosettes, serrated saz leaves and scrolling vine, together with named flowers such as the tulip, carnation, rose and hyacinth. Anatolian floral drawing is stylized and flattened rather than observed from life.
What is a palmette in a Turkish rug?
A fan-shaped flower head split down the middle and opened flat, descended from the lotus and honeysuckle of ancient ornament. It is the commonest floral unit in Turkish weaving and, in an Oushak, it can be drawn at the size of a dinner plate.
What is the difference between Oushak and Karabakh floral drawing?
Oushak sets large stylized palmettes and cloudbands far apart on an open madder and apricot field. Karabakh weaving of the nineteenth century took European rose bouquets from imported textiles and placed them, unstylized and full size, on dark indigo or black grounds.
Which flowers appear most often in Ottoman design?
Four, from the mid-sixteenth century onward: the tulip, the carnation, the rose and the hyacinth, frequently with a spring blossom branch. All are drawn flat and without shading, the carnation as a fan of jagged petals and the hyacinth as a bent stem of small bells.
Do floral rugs show dirt?
Less than plain ones. A multicolored floral field breaks up the eye and conceals both soil and traffic wear, which is one reason patterned rugs have always outlasted plain ones in dining rooms and hallways.
Are floral rugs only traditional?
No. The same vocabulary is woven in muted vintage palettes, in abstract and faded interpretations on loom-woven bamboo viscose and Tencel, and in machine-woven versions at set sizes, alongside the classical hand-knotted wool and silk drawing.
What furniture suits a floral rug?
Plain upholstery in a solid color, and wood rather than more pattern. A dense floral field is already doing the decorative work of the room, so competing pattern above it makes both harder to read.
Related collections: medallion rugs · classic rugs · vintage rugs · geometric-patterned rugs