The Rug Library

Oriental carpet design traditionally emphasises a flat surface pattern, while European carpet designs lean towards painterly effects such as shading, pictorial scenes and architectural motifs.

During Iran's Qajar period, small repeating patterns such as the herati, minakhani and offset boteh became standard parts of the carpet design repertoire, with regional variations.

In the Mughal period the boteh merged with images of flowering plants, becoming the tapered, curved flowering bush now seen in Kashmiri shawl borders.

From the 1850s, Maharaja Sawai Ram Singh II introduced carpet weaving at Jaipur Central Jail; early designs were copied from his royal collection and later from Persian and Turkish carpets.

Many 19th-century Indian jail carpets used designs chosen by British overseers, reflecting a taste for classical 16th- and 17th-century Persian and Mughal patterns.

Millefleur design is linked to Eastern decorative influence and a trend in later Mughal ornament towards smaller, more intricate elements.

Some later millefleur carpets show declining materials, with cotton wefts and lower knot density, while still recalling the luxury court carpets they descend from.

An East India Company officer, William Fremlin, ordered a Mughal animal carpet bearing his coat of arms, probably woven in Lahore in the 1640s and now at the V&A.

Panja dhurries take their name from the panja, a claw-shaped beating tool; 'panja' is the Hindi word for claw or paw.

Salawas, a village on the outskirts of Jodhpur in Rajasthan, is known for its panja dhurrie weaving tradition, which local accounts trace back several centuries.

Because they are woven rather than knotted, panja dhurries are lightweight and reversible, unlike pile carpets.

Rajasthan, Haryana and Madhya Pradesh are among the main dhurrie-producing regions of India, with Jaipur and Jodhpur noted for cotton dhurries.

A dhurrie (also spelled durrie, durry or dari) is a thin, flat handwoven rug from the Indian subcontinent, traditionally used both as a floor covering and as bedding.

Dhurries are woven from cotton, wool, jute or silk, or from combinations of these fibres, and being light and foldable they are easy to carry and store.

Navalgund durries, cotton flat-weaves with geometric, bird and animal designs from Navalgund in Karnataka's Dharwad district, were registered as a Geographical Indication in 2011.

In 1975 IIM Ahmedabad began a Rural University Project in Jawaja, Rajasthan, and invited NID Ahmedabad designers to work with local weavers on dyeing, weaving quality and design.

Warangal durries, flat-woven cotton rugs from Telangana known for stripes and geometric patterns, received Geographical Indication status in 2018.

Most dhurries are weft-faced: undyed cotton or wool warps form the base, and densely packed coloured wefts cover them to form the design.

MAP Academy lists Hoshiarpur, Jodhpur, Varanasi, Warangal, Salem, Panipat, Belgaum and Pune among India's main dhurrie-producing centres.

The earliest probable evidence for an Indian flat-woven cotton rug is associated with finds from Niya in the Tarim Basin, dated roughly to the 1st–3rd centuries CE.

Craft historians associate Navalgund's durrie tradition with weavers who moved there from Bijapur in the 16th century, during the era of the Deccan Sultanates.

Warangal durries continue to be woven largely by the Padmasali community, with skills passed on through family apprenticeship.

Under the Ottoman, Safavid and Mughal dynasties, carpet weaving shifted from a village craft based on inherited patterns to a state-supported industry whose designs were created in court workshops.

The Girdlers' Carpet, roughly 27 by 8 feet, travelled from the port of Surat to London and was used as a table covering in the Girdlers' court room, making it one of the best-documented Mughal carpets.