Yet, a well-placed Oriental rug, that is one hand-knotted from Asia, can be the soul of a room. Which is why many designers suggest that, when decorating a room, you start with the rug. Of course, that’s fantasyland.
In the real world, rugs come last. “That’s a beautiful rug, honey, but what are we going to sleep on?” I have several of these rugs, which I’ve collected over the years, and would not part with, but recently I learned they’re not from where I thought they were. Doubts surfaced while I was in an Uber.
I got to talking with the Uber driver, that trustworthy of all sources, who was from Iran, where he worked in the rug trade. Naturally, I started asking questions like why is there so much distrust, price haggling, lying, and fraud in his business? I showed him a picture of a runner in my entryway. “Made in India,” he said, “in the Mamluk tradition, very common.
” “The guy who sold it to me was from Turkey, and implied it was from Turkey.” “Well, it might have come from Turkey, but it was made in India.” This seemed far-fetched enough to be true.
For clarification, I called Robert Mann, owner of Robert Mann Rugs, in Denver, one of the foremost rug authorities in the country. “The industry is not transparent,” he said. Mann has worked in the rug industry for 45 years.
He has made, repaired, sold, cleaned and appraised rugs. Today, he runs a large rug cleaning and repair facility. Yes, he explained, Turkey was once a major producer of rug.
