Rugsville Overdyed Turquoise Carpet 4' x 6'

The overdye process began as a salvage technique. Workshops would take a faded antique, wash it back to its base wool, and immerse the whole carpet in a single saturated bath, the way a painter glazes over an underdrawing. The original pattern survives as a ghost beneath the new colour, the layered surface holding both periods at once. Turquoise is the most demanding overdye because the original ground has to read warm enough to keep the new colour from reading cold; this carpet manages the balance the way a Klein blue manages the relationship between pigment and ground.

Two weavers spent around four months at the loom on the original weaving, then the finished carpet was washed back to its base, sheared, and lowered into a full-immersion bath of indigo and a small proportion of weld for the green shift. The pile is hand-spun wool on a cotton foundation, asymmetric knots, the slow weave that holds detail through the overdye process. Each step happens under the open sky because indigo cures in air rather than in heat.

The composition

A single saturated turquoise reading from corner to corner. Beneath the colour, the ghost of a classical floral repeat surfaces and recedes as the eye moves across the field, sometimes resolving into vine and palmette, sometimes dissolving into a single chromatic plane. The border is implied rather than drawn, a slight modulation in the dye that gives the field an edge without breaking the wash. The carpet reads at two distances, as a single colour from across a room and as a half-erased pattern up close.

What you are buying

Hand-knotted overdyed pieces of equivalent size and saturation move through London and New York dealers between two and four lakh rupees, more for older base carpets. The price here positions the carpet as an entry point to overdye collecting rather than a top-tier example. The carpet appreciates with use rather than depreciating, and the overdye continues to develop in light over the first decade. The base weaving is hand-tied wool, which means the structure is built to outlast the surface it carries.

The piece in a room

4' x 6' (122 x 183 cm) suits a sitting alcove, a study floor, the foot of a primary bed, or the entry of a flat where the carpet sets the tonal note for the rooms behind it. Turquoise this saturated needs neutral surroundings to read at full strength; whitewashed walls, raw plaster, oiled walnut, and bleached oak all hold the colour. The carpet pairs poorly with strongly patterned upholstery and well with single-toned linen, leather, and brass.

Conservation

Rotate every six months. Vacuum weekly on suction only. Blot spills downward with a clean cotton cloth, never rub across the pile. Indigo continues to oxidise for the first year, so a small loss of crock in early washes is normal and stops by year two. Engage a wool conservator every five years for hand cleaning. Under those terms the carpet runs sixty years and the overdye continues to deepen for most of that time.

Reference

• Medium: hand-knotted hand-spun wool on cotton foundation
• Dimensions: 122 x 183 cm (4' x 6')
• Construction: Persian asymmetric knot
• Hands: 2 weavers, ~4 months on the original weaving plus overdye finishing
• Pile: 8 mm
• Dye: indigo overdye on vegetable-dyed base
• Origin: India

Free shipping anywhere in India. Cash on delivery available. 7-day exchange. The carpet ships in a sealed wooden crate suitable for storage and onward transport.