Cream Geometric Handwoven Wool and Silk Afghan Kilim

Silk in the figures, wool in the ground: a handwoven Afghan kilim, 104 × 168 cm (3'5" × 5'6"), cream, with geometry drawn across the field in a fiber that catches light where the wool around it does not.

01The geography of the weave

Made in Afghanistan, flat, with no pile at all. One piece. Silk in a flatweave does one thing and does it completely. Wool absorbs light and returns a matte, even tone; silk returns it directionally, so the same figure looks pale seen from one side of the room and bright from the other, and walking past the piece makes the drawing appear to move.

02Which tone on the ground

On a cream ground that effect is at its most legible, since no strong color competes with the shift. The geometry is angular throughout, as it has to be — a flatweave builds shapes out of steps, and there is no way to draw a curve on one. Woven by hand in Afghanistan, wool and silk together.

03At the loom in in Afghanistan

The honest limitation of a silk-blend flatweave is durability. Silk is strong in tension and poor under abrasion, so the figures will polish and eventually thin in any place that is walked over daily. This belongs beside a bed rather than in a doorway, or on a wall. Specialist cleaning, and no water on the silk. Handwoven in Afghanistan in wool with silk. 104 × 168 cm (3'5" × 5'6"), a flatweave with no pile. Geometric drawing on a cream ground, stepped rather than curved. The silk figures shift between pale and bright as you move past. Silk wears under abrasion; keep it out of doorways and traffic lines. Suits a bedside, a quiet room or a wall. Specialist cleaning; no water on the silk. A single piece. It is at its best in a room somebody crosses twice a day, and at its worst in one they cross twenty times.