Black Karabagh-Pattern Hand-Knotted Wool Rug

Roses in orange, red, pink and green, drawn the way Karabagh has drawn them for centuries, laid across a ground of flat black. Hand-knotted in Afghanistan with a wool pile over a cotton foundation, and knotted with a double knot, which is what makes the surface feel packed under a thumb. Eight sizes are in stock and there is one piece of each, from 127 × 192 cm (4'2" × 6'4") to 215 × 301 cm (7'1" × 9'11").

Black is the rarest ground in Anatolian and Caucasian weaving, and it is used here for a specific reason: it takes the sweetness out of the flowers and leaves only their color. The roses sit in the field and again in the border bands, and the overall effect is closer to a garden seen at dusk than to a floral rug. What we wanted from this pattern was the warmth the flowers put back into the black — that was the whole brief. Beside English furniture or heavy oak it turns classical; in a bare modern room it becomes the only ornament there is.

Everything underfoot is wool. The foundation is cotton, and a trace of synthetic yarn goes into it for strength, which is a thing worth stating plainly rather than leaving out. Double knotting takes longer and produces a pile that stands rather than leans, so the pattern holds its edges for far longer than a loosely knotted rug would. Colors this saturated on black will read differently in a north-facing room, where the pinks go cool and the whole rug drops a tone.

• Hand-knotted in Afghanistan using a double knot.
• Wool pile; cotton foundation with a trace of synthetic yarn for strength.
• Black ground with Karabagh roses in orange, red, pink and green, in the field and the borders.
• Eight sizes, a single piece of each, from 127 × 192 cm to 215 × 301 cm.
• Double knotting is slower and gives a pile that stands upright.
• In a north-facing room the pinks cool down and the rug reads darker.
• Specialist washing when it needs it, and a shake outdoors in between.

Black grounds fade slowly and unevenly, and the flowers will still be bright when the black has gone the color of wet slate.