Orange Anatolian Handwoven Wool Mut Kilim

Long and narrow — a hundred and thirty-one across and three hundred and thirteen down, which is 4'4" × 10'3" — and handwoven entirely in wool in the villages of Mut, in Mersin province. Orange leads the color and the rest of the Anatolian palette answers it. Flat-woven, no pile, old, and one of one. This is the shape of a corridor and of the strip beside a long kitchen counter, and it is also the shape of half a floor in a house where kilims were laid in pairs.

01Where it is laid

Anything narrower than about a meter forty reads as a runner and behaves like one: it wants a straight run to sit in, and it will look wrong pushed under furniture in the middle of a room. Orange in a piece this shape does something specific — a narrow band of warm color draws the eye along its length, so a corridor treated this way feels longer rather than wider, which may be exactly what you want or exactly what you do not. Wool warp and wool weft, woven on a village loom.

02The mark of slow weaving

Mut kilims come from the country between the Mediterranean and the Taurus foothills, and the weaving there has stayed domestic rather than becoming a workshop trade. Long pieces take the most wear at the two ends, where people step onto them, so plan to turn it end for end. Underlay matters more on a narrow piece than a wide one, since there is less mass holding it down.

03After the color

Have it washed by a kilim cleaner and not otherwise. Handwoven in wool in the villages around Mut, Mersin province. 131 × 313 cm (4'4" × 10'3"), a corridor or counter-side proportion. Orange-led, multicolored, with the Anatolian motif families across the length. A warm narrow band draws the eye along, so a hall reads longer. Flat-woven with no pile, and reversible. Wear concentrates at the two ends; turn it end for end periodically. Underlay is more necessary here than on a wide piece. Kilim-cleaner washing.

A single old piece. Narrow kilims were made for houses laid out in corridors, and there are more of those now than there were twenty years ago.