SERAPI Antique Persian Rug

The best Serapi rugs offer an evocative visual experience and sense of wonder that springs from the style’s resonant palette, illumined by a glowing patina of age. This totemic enchanter exudes a particularly ancient quality that is never achieved in younger carpets. An eight-petalled flower medallion emanates from a geometricised centerpiece with a single carnation blossom at its center. Hyper-stylized branches, buds, and flowerheads expand across the double reserve where giant palmette pendants meet the stepped corner spandrels. Within an immensely nuanced palette can be found dusky 19th-century hues in a visual orchestra of sunset reds, seafoam greens, shimmering aqua-cerulean, balanced by aged ivory, and ochre accents. The deft application of improvisational abrash color shifts, to create an interesting range of background textures. Lyrical, undulating vinery connects escutcheon palmettes in a tremendously spontaneous and playful manifestation of the Shah Abbas pattern.