9'10" x 13'5" Persian Sarough Rug | Red & Blue Floral Medallion | Signed Cartouche

A signed piece in excellent condition, this Persian Sarough rug measures 9'10" x 13'5" and carries a small woven cartouche in the inner border, the weaver's mark that separates a workshop commission from ordinary village output. The pile is 3/8" wool on a cotton foundation, still full and even edge to edge, with the crisp drawing and unbroken color you want in a rug this size. At 118" by 161" it sits squarely in the most useful of the 10x13 Persian rug sizes, large enough to carry a full seating group or a 10 seat dining table with chairs pulled clear of the border. Every rug we ship leaves Freeport with a certificate of authenticity recording origin, materials and measurements.

Design and Motifs

The layout is the classic Sarouk formula executed with unusual clarity. A large oval red field fills the center of the rug, carried on a dense all-over lattice of scrolling vine, 8 petal rosettes, serrated palmettes and small blossoms that never repeat in a way the eye can catch. At the middle sits a stepped star medallion, its indigo core holding an ivory 8 petal rosette and paired arabesque hooks, ringed by cream and gold cartouche-like lobes and finished with a crown of sharp navy and red points. The oval field is framed by a scalloped outline and set against a lighter open ground, with ivory scrolling spandrels drawn at all 4 corners in flowing curvilinear vine work. The main border runs navy with a reciprocal palmette and vine meander, flanked by 2 narrow guard stripes and the fine barber-pole minor bands typical of the region, and the signature cartouche breaks the inner guard band on one end.

Color

The dominant note is a warm tomato red, clear rather than brick, with just enough variation across the field to read as hand-dyed wool under changing light. Around the medallion oval the ground shifts to a soft cornflower and sky blue that lifts the whole rug and keeps the red from turning heavy, and the main border drops to a deep indigo navy that anchors all 4 edges. Ivory and oyster cream do the drawing work in the corner spandrels, the medallion center and the guard stripes, while the florals bring in rose pink, dusty coral, pale gold-beige and small hits of mid blue and slate. The back photograph shows the same palette in the knots, including traces of soft celadon green, which is a good sign of natural dye depth rather than surface tinting. In practice it is a red and blue rug that works against warm woods, brass, navy upholstery and cream walls.

Origin and Weave

Sarough is a weaving village in west-central Persia, in the Arak district of Markazi province, and its looms built their reputation on one thing above all: rugs that survive a lifetime of family traffic without losing their drawing. Weavers there work a dense, tightly packed knot on a cotton foundation with a heavy beat-down, then clip the wool to a firm 3/8" pile, which is why a Sarough feels solid underfoot and holds a pattern this detailed at room scale. The local wool is springy and takes dye cleanly, and the curvilinear medallion and vine style seen here is the house drawing that made these rugs the standard formal floor covering in American homes from the 1920s onward. The woven cartouche in the border marks this one as a named workshop piece, and the condition of the pile, ends and selvedges tells you it was looked after rather than worked hard.