Ürküm Series

The Ürküm Series is Halıcızade's own loom-woven rug line: a wool pile on a cotton foundation, woven in India with hand and machine work together, patterned with Gabbeh nomadic motifs, and made in four colorways across eight rectangular sizes and a 180 cm round.

The house writes the name Urkum, without the dots, in its product titles and in the address of this page; Ürküm is the same word and the same series. What follows is what the rugs are made of, how loom-weaving differs from hand-knotting, why a single Ürküm red is not one red, and which size belongs in which room.

A Halıcızade design, a year in the making

Ürküm was commissioned rather than bought off a supplier's shelf, and it is sold through Halıcızade alone in Turkey.

Twelve months separated the first sample images from the first rug laid on a floor: approval of the drawings, weaving in India, a sea passage to Turkey, then photography and cataloging. A year is a long lead time for a group of ten designs, and it is the reason the series arrived as a finished set of colorways and sizes rather than as a trickle of one-offs.

How an Ürküm rug is built

Wool pile on a cotton foundation, built row by row on a loom rather than tied knot by knot.

The warp runs the length of the loom under tension and emerges at either end as the fringe, which on these rugs is knotted by hand, strand by strand, rather than machine-stitched to the edge. The weft crosses after each row and locks the pile down. The pile is wool, cut level and left deliberately thick, which is why an Ürküm rug sits heavy and firm underfoot rather than thin and yielding. The weaving is hand work on a hand-operated loom, with machine power applied only to compact and secure the rows — tezgâh dokuma in Turkish, loom-woven in English.

Loom-weaving occupies the middle ground. It will not draw a curve as finely as a hand-knotted rug from Hereke or Kayseri, and it does not set out to; what it buys is a dense wool surface, consistent sizing and a price well under a hand-knotted piece of the same dimensions. Compare the alternative in hand-knotted rugs, or read how a loom-woven rug differs from a handwoven one.

One red, and several reds

Look closely at an Ürküm field and you will count three or four tones of what reads from the doorway as a single color.

The red ground is red, brick and a low burgundy at once, laid down as the weaver moves through dye lots of the same shade. From across a room the effect is depth rather than variation; from a meter away it is the clearest evidence on the rug that the yarn was dyed in batches rather than extruded to one reference number. Rug people call this abrash. In an antique rug it is often the best thing on the piece, and here it is designed in rather than apologized for.

The motifs are Gabbeh, and Gabbeh is nomadic

The drawing on an Ürküm rug comes out of the Gabbeh tradition, not out of an Anatolian court workshop.

Gabbeh is the coarse, thick nomadic pile weaving best known from the Zagros mountains of southwest Iran: few motifs, large open fields, animals and standing figures drawn from memory at whatever scale the weaver chose. Ürküm takes that vocabulary and sets it out symmetrically on a cleared ground — small pastel figures scattered across a strong field — then finishes the ends with fringes in mixed colors. The result is an ethnic-pattern rug rather than a regional Anatolian one, and the difference is worth stating plainly. For rugs woven to Anatolian village patterns instead, see Anatolian rugs.

Colorways and sizes

Four colorways cover the whole size range, and two more exist in a single mat size.

Red, yellow, blue and beige are each made in eight rectangular sizes and as a 180 cm round. Green and navy are currently woven in 60 x 90 cm only. The palettes divide about the way you would expect: red and yellow put a warm center in a room and carry pastel and neutral furniture well, while blue and beige sit back and let the furniture do the talking.

Size (cm)	Approx.	Area	What it is for
60 x 90	2' x 3'	0.5 m²	Entry mat, bedside, kitchen door
90 x 150	3' x 4'11"	1.4 m²	Bedside pair, small entry, reading chair
120 x 180	3'11" x 5'11"	2.2 m²	Coffee-table island, child's room
90 x 300	3' x 9'10"	2.7 m²	Runner for a corridor or a long kitchen
90 x 400	3' x 13'1"	3.6 m²	Runner for a long hall or a stair landing
160 x 230	5'3" x 7'7"	3.7 m²	Small living room, foot of a double bed
200 x 300	6'7" x 9'10"	6.0 m²	Standard living room, front sofa legs on the rug
230 x 330	7'7" x 10'10"	7.6 m²	Large living room, all furniture legs on the rug
180 round	5'11" across	2.5 m²	Under a round dining table, a bay window, a bed corner

The runner lengths are the ones most often underestimated; see hallway runners for how a 90 cm width behaves in a corridor, and round rugs for the 180 cm circle under a dining table.

Living with an Ürküm rug

Treat it as the wool rug it is.

Vacuum with the beater bar switched off and in the direction of the pile. Rotate the rug twice a year so that light and traffic land somewhere new. Blot a spill at once and never rub it, since rubbing drives the liquid down to the base of the pile where it sets. When it needs more than a vacuum, send it to a professional rug washer — this is not a machine-washable rug, and a new wool pile releases a little loose fiber over its first months in the house, which vacuuming clears. More on the fiber and its upkeep sits with the wool rugs.

Frequently asked questions

Where are Ürküm Series rugs made?

The Ürküm Series is woven in India on hand-operated looms, with machine power used only to compact and secure the rows. The designs were commissioned by Halıcızade, and the series is sold through Halıcızade alone in Turkey.

What are Ürküm Series rugs made of?

Wool pile on a cotton foundation. The cotton warp and weft carry the structure while the wool carries the color and the wear, and the fringes at either end are knotted by hand rather than sewn on.

Is a loom-woven rug the same as a hand-knotted rug?

No. A hand-knotted rug is tied knot by knot on a vertical loom; a loom-woven rug such as Ürküm is built row by row on a hand-operated loom, which is faster and costs less. The pile is still dense wool, but the back reads more regular than a hand-knotted back.

What colors and sizes does the Ürküm Series come in?

Four colorways run the full size range: red, yellow, blue and beige, in eight rectangular sizes from 60 x 90 cm to 230 x 330 cm, plus a 180 cm round. Green and navy are currently woven in the 60 x 90 cm mat size only.

Why does the color shift slightly across an Ürküm rug?

Because the yarn is dyed in lots and several tones of one shade are used across a single rug. A red field carries brick and low burgundy alongside it. Weavers call this abrash, and it is a mark of dyed-yarn weaving rather than a fault.

How should an Ürküm rug be cleaned?

Vacuum with the beater bar off, in the direction of the pile, and blot spills rather than rubbing them. The pile is wool, so send the rug to a professional rug washer instead of washing it at home or putting it in a machine.

Related collections: wool rugs · round rugs · hallway runners