The Making of a Persian Rug: From Design to Finish

As you tour the workshops in Qom, you'll see just how many processes go into making a carpet. There's the room where the designs are drawn, the yard where the threads are dyed, the workshop with rows of looms, the washing area, and the craftsmen with their shearing blades. A single carpet passes through the hands of many specialists, each with their own expertise, before it reaches you.

Here, we will follow all the processes involved in making a Persian carpet, from drafting the design to the final finishing. Each process is explained in more detail in separate articles, so if you're interested in a particular step, please delve deeper using the links within the text.

Drafting — Drawing the Blueprint

Everything begins with drafting, which determines "what kind of carpet will be woven." Nomadic carpets are often woven without a blueprint, relying on the weaver's intuition, which results in a unique, rustic quality for each piece. In urban workshops, however, specialized designers (Naqqash) draw the designs on a grid-like paper. Each square corresponds to a single knot, a painstaking process of precisely specifying colors and patterns.

In workshops in Qom, Isfahan, and Tabriz, designs are often passed down through families, and new creations emerge as classical compositions that have been used for generations are refined. The quality of the initial drafting determines the artistic merit of the finished carpet.

Dyeing — Dyeing the Threads

Running parallel to the drafting is the preparation of the threads. Wool and silk threads are first washed to remove oils and dirt, preparing them for dyeing. Then they are immersed in dye to absorb the color.

Dyes include traditional natural dyes (vegetable dyes) and modern synthetic dyes. Natural dyes come from sources like indigo, pomegranate rind, turmeric, madder, and walnut husks. Each is boiled down, and craftsmen adjust the immersion time, temperature, and mordant usage based on their experience. The depth of color can change significantly depending on how it's dyed, even with the same material, making the dyer's judgment a critical part of the process.

Some workshops, like the main Jamshidi family workshop, still uphold vegetable dyeing today. The characteristic of vegetable dyes is that they don't produce a uniform color like chemical dyes; instead, there are subtle variations in color for each thread, which creates depth when woven. For more on the background of material selection, please refer to Wool and Silk — Which to choose for your first rug.

Warping — Stretching the Warps

Before weaving begins, the loom must be prepared. This involves stretching the warp threads (vertical threads) between the upper and lower beams of the loom. This section will later become the fringe. While it may seem like a simple preparatory step, if the tension of the warp threads is not uniform here, the entire shape of the carpet will be distorted.

Once the loom is ready, a few centimeters of kilim (flat-woven section) are woven at the top and bottom ends to support the structure. This forms the base upon which the pile will be knotted.

Hand-weaving — Knot by Knot

The core process of Persian rug making is hand-weaving. Colored pile threads are tied one by one to the warp threads, then weft threads are passed through and beaten down with an iron comb to secure the knots. This is repeated hundreds of thousands, even millions, of times.

There are two main knotting methods: the "Persian knot" (single knot), which wraps around only one warp thread, and the "Turkish knot" (double knot), which ties around two warp threads. Silk carpets from Qom and Isfahan almost exclusively use the Persian knot, while wool carpets from Tabriz and other regions primarily use the Turkish knot. For more details, please see Persian Carpet Knotting — The Difference Between Persian and Turkish Knots.

Even a skilled weaver in Qom can only complete a few centimeters per day. It's not uncommon for a 1-million-knot silk carpet measuring one square meter to take several years to complete.

Removing from the Loom — Detaching from the Loom

Once the weaving is complete, the warp threads are not immediately cut. First, a few centimeters of flat weave called "kilim" are woven at the top and bottom edges of the carpet, and then the edges are reinforced with chain stitching or overcasting. This creates a structure that prevents the pile from unraveling.

Only when these preparations are complete are the upper and lower warp threads finally cut. The cut bundles of warp threads then form the fringes of the carpet. In the case of silk, since the threads are delicate, craftsmen work with extreme care to ensure the knots do not loosen.

A carpet immediately after being removed from the loom is not yet a finished product. The pile length is uneven, dust and loose threads remain, and the luster of the silk is not yet fully developed.

Shearing — Trimming the Pile

After being removed from the loom, the carpet undergoes the "shearing" process, where the pile on the surface is trimmed to an even length. Specialized fan-shaped blades or dedicated machines are used to level out even slight differences in height.

The angle of the blade and the amount of pressure are adjusted based on the craftsman's years of experience. This is a tense process, as even a few millimeters can blur the outlines of the pattern or diminish the luster. Once shearing is complete, the previously indistinct outlines of the design become sharp and clear, and the carpet's appearance is transformed.

Washing — Final Cleaning

Next comes the process of washing the newly woven carpet with water. In Japan, when we hear "washing," we tend to imagine a process done after extensive use, but for Persian carpets, it's an essential finishing step for a new product. This crucial process achieves three effects at once: it removes excess dye and lint that accumulated during weaving, it loosens the fibers to enhance softness, and it tightens the weave by allowing the carpet to absorb water and then dry.

For more detailed information, including a video, on the traditional washing methods used around Qom and the impact of Qom's dry climate and water quality on the finished product, please refer to The 'Washing' Process in the Qom Region — Finishing after Weaving.

Re-shearing — Final Adjustments

After washing and sun-drying, the carpet undergoes another shearing. This is a millimeter-level final adjustment performed after the fibers have settled during the washing process.

The pile that was sheared before washing may slightly shift during washing and drying, or tiny protruding fibers might become visible. By neatly aligning these at the very end, the outlines of the patterns become even clearer, and the luster rises uniformly. This is a task that relies solely on the craftsman's tactile sense and years of experience, rather than a manual.

Fringe and Edge Finishing

Finally, there's the finishing work to tidy up the perimeter of the carpet.

For the fringe, the ends of the warp threads cut when removed from the loom are tied one by one to prevent unraveling, creating a neatly arranged fringe. The knotting method and fringe length often show characteristics specific to the region or workshop.

The edges, on both sides, are reinforced by repeatedly overcasting along the warp threads with yarn of the same material as the carpet itself. Since these areas are prone to fraying with daily use, a well-finished edge is a condition for a long-lasting carpet. The blue edge in the photo is an example of delicate finishing tailored to the carpet's color scheme.

A Single Piece Through All Processes

The Jamshidi workshop's piece in the video, a vegetable-dyed carpet, took 18 months to weave. Drafting, dyeing, warping, hand-weaving, removing from the loom, shearing, washing, re-shearing, and finishing the fringe and edges. Only after all these processes are completed does it finally come to market.

It's often said that it "takes an incredibly long time," but that's not just the weaving time. Including the preparation and finishing steps before and after, each process involves specialized craftsmen, and their individual judgments accumulate to create a single carpet.

When you pick up a Persian carpet in a store, I hope you'll feel, even a little, the vast number of processes and human hands behind the visible patterns and luster. If you have any questions about a particular process, please ask the owner of Golestan. I'll be happy to share real-life examples I've seen in person.