Ziegler & Co., the Swiss-British firm operating from northern Iran in the late nineteenth century, refined the Sultanabad cartoons into the open, airy compositions that defined the Anglo-American drawing room for two generations. The green and beige reading of that lineage in this rug belongs to the more pastoral end of the Ziegler register, where the field is calmed with botanical greens and the contrast brought down so the wool can carry the work.

Three weavers shared the upright loom for close to six months. Hand-spun wool was dyed in small lots over copper, the green drawn from a careful layering of indigo and weld and the beige left close to the natural fleece with a light wash. Roughly 1.4 million Persian-asymmetric knots were tied by feel against a cotton warp, beaten down by hand, and finished with a hand-shear to a uniform pile.

The composition

A field of soft beige carrying floral arabesques in muted sage green, with accents of faded madder, ivory, and walnut brown. The composition is open. The border holds a single restrained guard rather than the layered borders that turn lesser Sultanabads busy. The green is the work; the beige carries it. Over the first decade the green will deepen by half a stop and the beige will warm into a closer cream.

What you are buying

Antique Sultanabads with early twentieth-century attribution and comparable condition trade at international auction in the range of twenty to forty thousand US dollars when they appear at all. This is a new weaving in the same Ziegler tradition, on the same kind of loom, in the same fibre, at a fraction of the antique price. The carpet appreciates with use rather than depreciating.

The piece in a room

8' x 10' (244 x 305 cm) anchors a primary drawing room or holds a six-seat dining table. The green and beige palette reads against cream plaster walls, against pale oak floors, and against deep walnut joinery. It pairs with linen upholstery in oatmeal or bone, with brass lighting, and with art that uses warm whites and earth tones. The Ziegler composition rewards rooms used for daily living.

Conservation

Suction vacuum every week with the beater bar disengaged. Rotate end to end each spring and autumn. Blot spills with a clean white cotton cloth from the edge inward. A wool conservator should hand-wash the rug every five years. With this care the carpet runs eighty years and outlives its first owners.

Reference

• Medium: hand-knotted wool on cotton foundation
• Dimensions: 244 x 305 cm (8' x 10')
• Construction: Persian asymmetric knot, Ziegler-Sultanabad pattern
• Hands: 3 weavers, ~6 months
• Pile: 10 mm hand-spun wool
• Dye: vegetable (indigo, weld, madder, walnut)
• Colour: green and beige
• Origin: India

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