Cream Oushak Hand-Knotted Wool and Silk Rug, Harem Series

Erzurum fleece and genuine Bursa silk, worked into the same pile: Cream Oushak Hand-Knotted Rug in Wool and Silk, Harem Series — 144 × 193 cm (4'9" × 6'4"), knotted in Türkiye, a cream ground carrying fourteenth- and fifteenth-century Uşak drawing in brown.

Cream is the hardest ground to draw an Oushak on, because the pattern has nowhere dark to hide against. Everything here is legible: the branch turns, the flower heads, the way the border repeats without quite repeating. With silk in the pile, the rug is one thing under a window and another under a lamp, and the wool holds steady while the silk moves. Beside walnut and unbleached linen it looks domestic; beside anything painted it looks considerably older than it is.

Çınar Halı in Türkiye weaves the Harem series, and the firm, known well beyond Türkiye, has won awards for its designs. Its fleece comes out of Erzurum, where enough natural oil stays in the wool to make it strong and bright at once. Its silk is genuine Bursa silk. Both are tied with the Anatolian double knot, one knot wrapped around a pair of warp threads. Send it to a washer who takes silk.

• Woven in Türkiye by Çınar Halı, a house with award-winning designs.
• Erzurum fleece wool with genuine Bursa silk.
• Fourteenth- and fifteenth-century Uşak drawing, redrawn for a modern room.
• Tied with the Anatolian double knot, around a pair of warp threads.
• Cream ground with brown drawing, 144 × 193 cm (4'9" × 6'4"), 2.8 m² (30 sq ft).
• The silk changes the rug between daylight and lamplight.
• Specialist washing.

A cream Oushak is the one that ends up in the room people are actually shown into.