Blue Floral Handwoven Wool and Bamboo Viscose Rug, Safir Series

Its blue is the color of an overcast winter sky rather than of water: a floral rug from the Safir Series, 198 × 295 cm (6'6" × 9'8"), handwoven in India, wool surface on cotton, bamboo viscose in the motifs, closed by a cream and gold border.

01Color, by the light

One piece. Softness in the ground makes the drawing possible. Every motif was trimmed around by hand with shears once the knotting had finished, so the pattern stands slightly above the surface and casts a small shadow that moves as the light does — a relief the palm finds as readily as the eye does.

02The origin of the pattern

The cream-gold border draws a warm line around all that coolness. The knotting is dense, which is what fine floral work needs if it is going to survive being woven at all, and it is why the outlines here are sharp rather than approximate. This series is woven for Halıcızade in India: cotton below, wool knotted above it.

03From ground to pile

Bamboo viscose is used only in the drawing, where it throws light back the way silk throws it; the wool does the warmth and the wear. The reading of the Oushak repertoire is pastel and contemporary rather than antique.

04After the color

Blue at this scale is a strong decision — it will look right beside burgundy-toned wood and beside gray and cream, and it will look wrong beside orange. Have it washed by a professional and left alone otherwise. Handwoven in India for this house: wool surface, cotton foundation. 198 × 295 cm (6'6" × 9'8") — a large salon or a bedroom taken end to end. Soft overcast blue with a cream and gold border around it. Motifs carved out one by one with shears, leaving a raised, shadowed relief. Bamboo viscose in the drawing for a silk-like shine; wool for the warmth and the wear. Dense knotting, which is what keeps fine floral outlines clean. A pastel, modern reading of classical Oushak drawing. Sits with burgundy-toned wood or with gray and cream. A blue floor is a colder thing than people expect, and in a south-facing room that is exactly what it is for.