How Long Does It Take to Make a Handmade Rug?
The Journey Behind the Craftsmanship of Our Handmade Rugs
This is one of the questions we get asked in the showroom all the time.
Each of our handmade rugs is completely different, and its journey — and timeline — is as unique as the piece itself. So there’s no single definitive answer — but once you begin to understand how our handmade rugs are made, the picture starts to become clearer.
Alex, our founder and buyer, spends time travelling through the weaving regions we source our handmade rugs from — seeing rugs on looms, watching yarn being dyed and visiting finishing workshops — which gives a real appreciation for just how much work goes into creating a single rug.
It All Starts With the Wool
Wool has been used in rug making for centuries because of its incredible durability and natural resilience, which makes it perfectly suited to everyday living.
But before the wool even reaches the loom, it has to be prepared. The fleece is cleaned, carded and spun into yarn before being dyed to create the colours used in the rug.
The dye traditions vary across weaving regions, from the vibrant tones of our Kazak rugs to the rich earth colours of our Mamluk rugs and the bold colour palettes of our Taimany rugs.
We've been lucky enough to see these processes first hand on our travels, and it's clear just how much skill is involved in the preparation and dyeing of the wool — something that can take years to master.
Between washing the fleece, spinning the yarn and dyeing and drying the colours, this early stage alone can take several weeks, before the loom is even prepared.
Only once the yarn is ready can the weaving begin.
Preparing the Loom
Meanwhile, the loom — the frame that holds the rug while it is being woven — is prepared.
Strong vertical warp threads are stretched tightly across the loom to form the structure of the rug, usually made from wool or cotton. Getting the tension right is crucial. If the warp threads aren't evenly set, the finished rug won't sit square or flat.
Once the loom is prepared, the rug begins to take shape, knot by knot.
How Hand-Knotted Rugs Are Made
Aside from our flat-weave kilims, all the handmade rugs we source are hand-knotted.
Working from a design, skilled weavers hand-tie individual knots of wool onto the loom, knot by knot, row by row. The rug slowly begins to take shape.
The weaving stage alone can take several months, and for larger or more intricate rugs it can take a year or more to complete.
Every single knot has to be tied carefully and consistently so the pattern and structure of the rug remain true.
When we talk about hand-knotted rugs, we're talking about someone tying thousands — often tens of thousands — of individual knots by hand over many months.
When you stop and think about that, it gives a real sense of the enormity of the task and the time, patience and skill involved in creating the beautiful handmade rugs we're so proud to show you in our Petworth showroom.
But even after the weaving is complete, the rug still isn't finished.
The Finishing Process of a Handmade Rug
Once the rug comes off the loom it still has several important finishing stages to go through.
It is washed, stretched and shaped, and for hand-knotted rugs the surface of the pile is trimmed by hand to create an even finish. The edges and fringes are also secured.
The finishing stage can take several days or weeks depending on the size of the rug.
Many of the rugs we source from Afghanistan are brought across the border and finished in specialist workshops in Pakistan.
Alex regularly visits these workshops on sourcing trips, inspecting the finished pieces and hand-selecting only the very best of the best to bring back to our Petworth showroom.
So How Long Does It Take to Make a Handmade Rug?
How long is a piece of string — or yarn in this case?
Every rug is different and the time it takes is as unique as the piece itself. However, we use a rule of thumb which is that a 12' x 9' rug of a finely woven quality can take on average 12 months from wool preparation to the final finishing steps.
Once you understand the journey, you start to appreciate the remarkable amount of work behind each handmade rug, and just how much time, patience and skill go into creating every single piece.
Written by Alex Rees
