Buying an Oriental Rug? What You Really Need to Know.

In addition to offering museum-quality antique Oriental rugs, we are the exclusive source for new, historically accurate, museum-quality Oriental rugs, including Persian rugs, Caucasian rugs, and Custom Oriental rugs.  Exclusive source?  What does this mean?

It means, with respect to our new rugs, no one else deals exclusively in new, entirely handmade Oriental rugs handcrafted with the same methods, materials, designs, techniques, and traditions, and in most cases made in the same locations, by the same descendents, as the originals,  No one else can make this claim.

Unfortunately, nearly all new Oriental rugs today come from Afghanistan, China, Egypt, India, Nepal, Pakistan, Romania, Tibet and a dozen or so other far-off places far removed from where authentic, indigenously produced Oriental rugs were originally made.  And usually, but not always, these rugs are made from low-quality materials employing cheap, unskilled labor.

Where are Richard Rothstein rugs made?

All of our rugs are made in the Caucasus, Persia, or Turkey, just like the originals.

Nearly all of our Oriental rugs are Caucasian rugs, Northwest Persian rugs, or Turkish rugs (including Anatolian rugs and Oushak rugs).  Why?  

Because by all accounts these are the most sought-after, collectible, and valuable Oriental rugs.  In fact, square-foot for square-foot, they collectively hold virtually every world auction record for wool, antique Oriental rugs.  Example: Caucasian Star Kazak (world record, Christie's, 2001); Caucasian Eagle Kazak (world record, Freeman's, 2006); Caucasian Kuba Karagashli (world record, Sotheby's, 2004); Northwest Persian Bakhshaish (world record, Sotheby's, 2006); Anatolian / Oushak Lotto carpet (world record, Sotheby's, 2007).

Visit The Metropolitan Museum of Art, The Philadelphia Museum of Art, The Textile Museum, The Louvre, The Hermitage, or The Victoria & Albert Museum, for example, and not surprisingly one can find Caucasian rugs, Northwest Persian rugs, and Turkish rugs prominently displayed in their collections.  Likewise, glance through any Sotheby's Oriental rug auction catalog, or stroll the floors of the White House or the Diplomatic Reception rooms, and again the overwhelming majority of the rugs are Caucasian rugs, Northwest Persian rugs, and Turkish rugs.

Who makes our new Oriental rugs?

We do.  Our weavers.  All of whom are adult women who learned the art of weaving from their mothers and their grandmothers.  Our weavers are highly skilled artisans who earn more than their local teachers or policemen. See how our Oriental rugs are made.

How are our new Oriental rugs made?

Entirely by hand, exactly as the originals were made. Pure, hand-spun wool of the highest quality, and pure, all-natural dyes (including all-vegetable dyes and vegetal dyes). For example, it takes hundreds of pomegranates rinds and onion skins just to make one color for several medium-sized rugs.

And all of the above is precisely why I started this business.

I personally collect antique Oriental rugs, I grew up in a family that has a world-class collection of antique Oriental rugs, and as a young adult when I started shopping for new Oriental rugs, I was disheartened with what I saw was available. As a result of this experience, I decided to start my own company and have rugs .

Today, I travel to the region every three to four months to oversee the production.