Magic Carpet A Beautiful Rug Can Pull A Room Together, But Don’T Pay Top Dollar For Poor Craftsmanship

In Iran, a handmade rug of wool or silk is the main furnishing of a room. “No matter how rich or poor, you have rugs,” says Ali Raisdana, owner of Persian Bazaar Gallery in Wichita, Kan.

The rugs are also a family’s greatest assets. “In Iran, when you go to a bank to borrow money, they take your rug as collateral. When people go on vacation, the rugs go into a vault in the bank. Underground storage areas in the Tehran bazaar are brimming with the finest of rugs, bought and kept like stocks and bonds,” Ali Raisdana says.

Rugs can do the same for homeowners here, offering beauty to enjoy every day and a lasting value, says Ali Raisdana and Bahman Rais Dana, owner of ApaDana Oriental Rug galleries. Both opened stores, in 1969 and 1973, after coming from Iran to study in the U.S. They recently talked about the history of their native country’s rugs and advised the best way to buy a rug.

A Persian or Oriental rug is always of natural materials. Most rugs are wool, with perhaps a tiny amount of silk as an outline or a shading on a leaf or petal. Two percent or less are all-silk; even fewer are of goat or camel hair. Typically, the warp and the weft, the framework of the rug, are of cotton, which is best. A few rugs have wool warps and wefts; some of those rugs will not lie smoothly.

And it must be completely handmade, its pile created by tens of thousands of tiny knots. One person working alone, as the finest rugs are made, will take at least a year to finish a small area rug.

The number of knots is the quality most commonly cited for Persian rugs. For example, says Bahman Rais Dana, a rug from India might be 50 radj, meaning it has 50 knots per square centimeter, or about 325 knots a square inch. A rug from Iran would be more like 120 radj, almost 800 knots a square inch.

“The thicker the yarn, the bigger the knot and you cannot shear it so close. With thinner yarn, the knots are smaller. In general, the finer the rug, the thinner the yarn will be and the thinner the rug will be,” says Ali Raisdana.

But the density of the knots isn’t the only factor, the two dealers say.

Quality of wool can vary widely, and it affects the quality of the rug and its value. The quality depends on the age and breed of the sheep, where it lived, when it was sheared and from what part of the body the wool is from. It’s difficult to judge, but one way is to press on the pile. The harder the wool, the higher its quality, says Ali Raisdana.

One caution with silk rugs is that some are actually synthetics, the two dealers say. “They feel like silk, they look like silk. But they are not,” says Ali Raisdana. The synthetic silk rug will be stiff if bent. But the sure-fire test is to burn it - a thread - to see if it flames up, as real silk will, or melts, as plastic will.

Perhaps the most important factor is the country of origin, with rugs from Iran the most valuable.

“If you have two rugs the same, the one from Iran will be more,” says Bahman Rais Dana.

The art of rug making began in Persia more than 3,500 years ago, and the government maintains strict controls on quality. Also, trade sanctions against Iran in the past 20 years have made it impossible today to import directly from Iran so scarcity raises their price.

Twenty years ago, Iran was the only country producing quality rugs, both dealers say. But now, other countries - such as India, China, Turkey, Pakistan and Afghanistan - make excellent Persian-design rugs.

“These days, India is working very hard on their rug industry and are the most successful,” Bahman Rais Dana says, noting that India is the world’s leading rug exporter. “I’m not telling you they are the best, but for the look at the lowest price, they are the best.”

The price can vary, from less than $100 for a 2 by 3-foot accent rug to hundreds of thousands for the best antiques.

“An area rug, 8-by-10, a new one, will average $1,400 to $2,200, and go up to $20,000,” says Bahman Raisdana. “For $1,600 to $1,700, you get a very good-looking rug that lasts forever.”

A real Persian rug, one from Iran, of the same size would range from $15,000 to more than $20,000.

Antique rugs, those more than 75 years old, are even more challenging to judge and buy. One clue is color: An antique rug will never have a green background because green is a holy color, although green rugs are made for export. The most common colors in antique rugs are red and dark blue.

Antique rugs are much more expensive. Bahman Rais Dana’s current prize is a 12-by-18-foot Serapi, made in Iran 125 years ago. The rug was kept by a Kansas woman in her basement out of the sunlight so the cochineal red and indigo blue are as vivid as the day they came out of the dye pots.

“We have received calls, e-mails from dealers all over the country,” he says, adding the rug is priced at more than $100,000. “We call it our Microsoft stock. It is like an old, old Mercedes. This is a collector’s piece.”

Persian rugs can not only hold their value but increase it because of their durability. “The hand-knotted rug, no matter where you put it, it is safe. Put an oriental in your kitchen and no problem,” says Bahman Rais Dana. “The more they are washed, the more beautiful the colors are, the more beautifully soft it is.”

How to choose?

“If it’s your first rug, I tell people to spend less,” says Ali Raisdana. “Live with it, enjoy it. Then, in two or three years, you want a more expensive rug, come back and trade or buy another.”

Buy the rug first, then build the room around it, Ali Raisdana says. Limiting yourself to a “prescription” of only a certain size or a few colors “narrows the choices too much,” he says. His only rule, he says, is that a rug in a dining room should extend far enough around the table that the chairs can be pushed back and not go off the rug.

Rugs can go on any floor from hardwood to tile or stone, even over wall-to-wall carpet. A pad keeps the rug from creeping or “slipping when you’re running to catch the phone,” Ali Raisdana says.

The less traffic, the finer, or thinner, a rug can be. But if it is in a heavy traffic area, you don’t want a fine rug, says Ali Raisdana. “You want a good rug, but one that is firmly woven with a good, strong wool. That’s the one you put by the doorway. Under the coffee table or by the fireplace, that’s where you want a fine one, such as silk, to put there.”