Hand Knotted Rugs

When talking about area rugs, you will see that there is basically a number of ways a rug is woven. A rug can either be knotted, tufted, flat woven, braided or hooked. They can also be woven by hand or using a machine. Among all the methods, the very best one is the hand knotted technique. Hand knotted rugs can be considered as the most luxurious and opulent rugs around. You must have already seen the price range for hand knotted rugs. It is no surprise that these rugs are sold at sky-high prices. Why is there such great value placed on hand knotted rugs?

Hand knotted rugs are synonymous with oriental rugs, persian rugs or rugs that come from the Middle or Far East. These rugs are handmade using techniques that have been passed down from one generation to the next. These century old painstaking weaving techniques result in very strong rugs. How are these hand knotted rugs made? 

Generally you will have two parts to a knotted rug. There is the base of the rug, and then you have the pile of the rug. The base is made of the warp or the threads that go along the length of the rug, and the weft which are threads that go across the rug and make up the width. The pile of the rug is the tufted yarns that can be seen.

First, the weaver will tie all the warp threads vertically on the loom, after which the weft of the horizontal threads are woven through the warp. This weft thread is meticulously woven one-by-one through the warp. What this means is that, as the weaver adds the weft thread to the warp, it is knotted to the warp threads and secured in place. These hand tied knots will create the pile and design of the rug. Threads that are used for the base or the warp are usually cotton. The pile will usually be high quality wool. Sometimes the whole rug is made entirely out of wool.  There are also cases where the pile uses some silk threads to make the designs more interesting. And of course there are also instances where the entire rug is woven out of silk. Silk rugs are the most expensive type of hand knotted rugs.

In handmade rugs, there are basically two types of knots that are used. The type of knot used would depend on where the said is produced, as different regions traditionally use different knots. The first type is the Persian knot. The Persian knot is found in handmade rugs from Iran, Tibet, Nepal, China, India and Afghanistan. Sometimes this knot is also referred to as the Senneth knot. This is a fine knot that is very suitable for curvilinear designs, such as flowers or curved geometric shapes. Thus it is a knot that is mostly used for complex patterns. The second type of knot is the Turkish knot. This knot is found in handmade rugs from Iran, Turkey, Azerbaijan and Armenia. It is also sometimes referred to as the Ghiordes knot or the double knot. This is a bulky knot which can produce a richer plusher pile.

There is also something called the Jufti knot. In reality the Jufti knot is not really another type of knot. It is more a method of tying the knots to the warp thread. Usually, in weaving high quality rugs, the weaver will tie the Persian or the Turkish knot around two warp threads. However, the Jufti knot is when the weaver ties the Persian or Turkish knot around four warp threads. Jufti knots will create a less fine handmade rug as it takes less time to complete the rug. Although these rugs are cheaper, they do not wear as well as the finer types of handmade rugs.

In the weaving process, the weaver will use a “gollab” or a small hooked knife to pull the weft threads through the warp. Once a row of weft has been completed the weaver will use a comb or a beater to secure the rows of weft and knots together. This process will make sure that the rug has a very tight weave. This whole process is repeated over and over again, until the whole rug is completed. The weaver will then use scissors to hand cut and clip the threads evenly from all the knots. Now that the whole rug is completed, the weaver will trim the warp threads at the top and the bottom to form the fringe of the rug.

As you can see, the hand knotting a rug is a laborious process that can take many months. Rug weavers need to be skilled so that the rugs produced are of the finest and strongest quality. An average weaver is able to tie up to 10,000 knots in a day. However a rug with a complex pattern may require very dense knotting, which means that one person may take many months to complete one rug.

The value of a hand knotted rug is largely determined by the number of knots that make up the rug. How can the number of knots be counted? Well, for hand knotted rugs, the knot density is important, and the density is calculated by the number of knots there are in a square inch. So this means that the higher the number of knots in one square inch of the rug, the more durable and valuable the rug is. Hand knotted rugs can have anywhere between 400 to 2,000 knots per square inch. In reality, a hand knotted rug which is above 1,200 knots can be considered rare and thus very valuable as these are amongst the finest rugs that can be made. Needless to say, they are also the world’s most expensive rugs ever.

The hand knotted rug is revered for its great beauty, quality, and durability. These rugs can be the most expensive purchase that you will ever make when it comes to floor rugs, but the purchase is well worth the investment.