Investing in a hand knotted rug is like buying a piece of art to walk on.
They are regarded as the best type of rug you can buy as a skilled weaver ties every single knot by hand to create intricate patterns and designs.
Hand Tufted Rugs:
Hand knotted rugs are not to be confused with hand tufted rugs.
Hand tufted rugs are produced by punching the yarn into a fabric backing and are together by glue.
The design of the rug is traced on the backing and and the colours are punched through accordingly.
Very little skill is required for this as it’s a bit like painting by numbers but can produce a quality rug much faster than doing it by hand.
Hand Knotted Rugs:
Producing a hand knotted rug is far more complicated as the warp (vertical) threads are tied to the loom and the weft (horizontal) runs across, intertwining with the warp to create the basis of the rug.
Knots are tied to the warp threads, cut and then tied again to form a secured knot, making hand knotted rugs extremely durable.
The warp will eventually form the fringe of the rug.
When you compare hand knotted rugs vs hand tufted, hand knotted rugs are superior in quality and style but this does not mean that there aren't quality crafted hand tufted rugs available.
When we look at how hand knotted rugs made there are a few different styles of hand knotted rugs and it's usually based on where in the world they are produced from.
Persian Knot:
One of the most popular hand knotted style of rug is a Persian rug.
A Persian knot is unsymmetrical and open on either side, this style is deal for high knot density rugs with extremely detailed patterns.
Hand knotted rugs from Nepal, eastern Iran, Afghanistan and India will use the Persian knot in their designs.
Turkish Knot:
The other popular knot style are found in hand knotted Turkish rugs; A Turkish knot is symmetrical and can be identified by two small loops within one knot, also known as a double knot.
This strong, symmetrical knot makes for a very consistent pile and is typically used in thicker carpets.
Rugs produced in Turkey, norther Iran, Armenia & Azerbaijan will usually have this style of knot.
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The Best Hand Knotted Rugs:
Neither type of knot is better than the other.
Both types of knots have advantages and disadvantages for hand knotted rugs, with each being better suited for the style and pattern of rug that they are used to make.
The type of knot should not determine your choice of rug, but it's good to understand how it is made and where it from.
Hand knotted rugs will always be of high quality but within that you can tell the quality of the rug by how many knots per square inch.
It can vary from 25 to over 1000 knots per square inch (kpsi).
Less than 80 kpsi suggests medium to poor quality. 100 - 200 kpsi good quality and anything more than 200 kpsi is exceptional quality.
The Best Compositions of Hand Knotted Rugs:
Silk & Wool
Hand knotted rugs will usually be made with silk and wool or a combination of both.
Sometimes, rug dealers may try to pass off man fibres as silk by using rayon and viscose.
Held up against real silk, you will easily be able to tell the difference as they don’t feel the same or have a natural sheen such as silk.
Silk
Silk, is composed from cocoons mainly from the silk butterfly's.
The cocoons consists of rawsilk, which are mainly a fibre that binds with the surrounding sericin.
Some carpets have the warp of silk and pile of wool where some details of the pattern are made of silk.
Wool
Wool is always a great and durable choice as its antibacterial and hypo-allergenic.
For the best wool rug look for rugs made with New Zealand wool.
When silk and wool are combined this creates an ultra durable hand knotted rugs with a sheen running through it.
Some designs will have wool as the bulk and the silk in certain parts, depending on what material you want to accentuate.
Other designs will have a twist fibre throughout containing both silk and wool.
Bamboo Silk
Hand knotted rug weavers are using bamboo silk more as it's more environmentally friendly than naturally produced caterpillar silk as bamboo silk is a type of natural viscose.
Cellulose is extracted from the plant and formed into a sticky paste and then left to dry.
Once dried, it becomes a soft silky fibre.
The result is a fibre that feels soft to the touch and is extremely durable and has hypoallergenic and antimicrobial properties.
Yarn Dyes:
Before 1860 yarn for rugs were dyed using natural methods and vegetable dye, in an effort to standardise and produce more even, uniform dye's, chemical dyes were produced.
However, this does not mean that modern hand knotted rugs will be chemically dyed as over the recent decades, suppliers have drifted back to using traditional methods.
Most dealers have considerable experience in determining whether the carpet was dyed with natural or synthetic dyes.
This comes from years of experience and looking at thousands of hand knotted rugs over their lifetime.
Chemical dyes tend to fade in light quicker than natural dyes and if there is a considerable amount of fading at the tip of the pile, then it is probably a synthetic dye.
Hand knotted rugs produced using natural dyes have an inherent character that cannot be reproduced using synthetic dyes.
When choosing or designing a rug, you can seek advice from the company you select on what type of material to use in certain parts of the rug design to best accentuate it. Hand knotted rug designs can contain anything from one colour to hundreds of different colours made up of different materials. You will find endless designs on the market from super contemporary to traditional. Vintage hand knotted rugs will have intricate designs and are often hang on the wall as pieces of art.
A hand knotted rug will last you a life time and beyond, often Persian rugs are passed down as family heirlooms as they retain their value and designs have become more rare over time.
