Don’t know your warp from your weft? You’re in good company. This plain-English glossary covers the words you’ll hear about your rug.
A
- Abrash
- Gentle shifts of color that run across a hand-knotted rug, caused by natural variation between dye lots or batches of wool. It is a hallmark of a genuinely hand-made piece, not a defect.
- Acrylic
- A synthetic fiber engineered to look and feel like wool. Soft and budget-friendly, it naturally resists moths — but it crushes and wears faster than real wool.
- All-Over Design
- A pattern that repeats edge to edge across the rug with no single dominant centerpiece, as opposed to a medallion layout.
- Aniline Dye
- An early class of synthetic dye from the 1800s. Bright but unstable — it can fade in sunlight and run when wet, which is exactly why we dye-test before washing.
- Antique
- In the trade, a rug roughly 80 to 100 years old or more. Age, condition, and origin all affect how (and whether) it should be wet-cleaned.
- Arabesque
- A flowing, interlaced design of vines, leaves, and blossoms rooted in Islamic art, often filling the field of fine Oriental rugs.
- Art Silk
- Short for “artificial silk.” A silk look-alike woven from rayon, viscose, or bamboo. It looks luxurious but is moisture-sensitive and easily damaged — it needs specialist handling.
- Asymmetrical Knot
- Also called the Persian or Senneh knot. It wraps one warp and passes loosely behind the next, allowing very fine, dense, curving designs.
B
- Bamboo Silk
- A soft, shiny fiber made from processed bamboo cellulose. A viscose-type fiber that browns easily if over-wetted, so it is cleaned with low moisture.
- Binding
- The finished, sewn edge along the long sides of a rug that locks the weave and keeps it from unraveling.
- Boteh
- The teardrop-and-curl motif that the West renamed “paisley.” It appears throughout Persian and Central Asian weaving.
- Border
- The framing bands that surround the field. A rug often has one main border flanked by thinner guard borders.
C
- Carding
- Combing and aligning raw fiber before it is spun into yarn, so the strands run cleanly in one direction.
- Contemporary
- A modern rug, generally made within the last 20 to 25 years, often in current colors and looser, more abstract patterns.
- Cotton
- A strong, stable plant fiber most often used for a rug’s foundation — the warp and weft that everything else is built on.
D
- Dhurrie
- A pile-less, flat-woven rug from India, usually cotton or wool, reversible and casual in feel.
- Dusting
- The first real step of facility cleaning: vibrating and airing the dry soil out of the rug’s foundation before any water touches it. It is the step in-home cleaning simply cannot do.
- Dye Bleed
- When color releases and migrates into lighter areas of the rug, usually from over-wetting or unstable dyes. Controlled washing and fast, even drying prevent it.
F
- Field
- The open central area inside the borders, on which the medallion or main design sits.
- Flat Weave
- A rug with no pile or knots — the design comes entirely from interlaced warp and weft. Kilims and dhurries are flat weaves.
- Flokati
- A thick, deeply shaggy hand-woven wool rug that originated in Greece.
- Foundation
- The structural skeleton of a rug — the warp and weft threads that hold the knots and give the rug its shape and strength.
- Fringe
- The exposed warp threads at each end of a rug, knotted off so the weave cannot unravel. It is part of the structure, not a trim added afterward.
G
- Gabbeh
- A coarse, thick Persian tribal rug with few knots per inch and simple, bold motifs in natural-dyed colors.
- Guard Border
- A narrow secondary border that frames the main border on either side.
H
- Hand-Knotted
- A rug tied knot by knot by hand on a loom — the most labor-intensive construction and the most valuable.
- Hand-Tufted
- Made by punching yarn through a fabric backing with a tool, then bonding a second backing on with latex. Faster and cheaper than knotting; the glue layer affects cleaning and lifespan.
- Herati
- A classic Persian all-over motif — a flower inside a diamond with curved leaves at the corners. Also called the “fish” pattern.
J
- Jute
- A natural plant fiber that is soft but weak when wet. Common in inexpensive rugs and in some rug backings.
K
- Kilim
- A pile-less, flat-woven rug with bold geometric designs, usually reversible.
- Knot Density
- The number of knots per square inch (KPSI). Higher density generally means finer detail and a higher-quality hand-knotted rug.
L
- Loom
- The frame that holds the warp threads under tension while a rug is woven or knotted.
M
- Machine-Made
- A rug produced on a power loom rather than by hand. Consistent and affordable, but not knotted and usually shorter-lived than a hand-made rug.
- Medallion
- A large central design element that anchors the field of many Oriental and Persian rugs.
- Motif
- Any repeated design element — a flower, a gul, a boteh — often specific to a region or weaving tribe.
N
- Nap
- The direction the pile naturally lies. Stroke it one way and it feels smooth and looks light; the other way feels rough and looks darker.
- Natural Dye
- Color drawn from plants, minerals, or insects — madder root, indigo, walnut husk. Prized for depth and for aging gracefully.
- Nylon
- A tough, resilient synthetic fiber widely used in machine-made rugs. It cleans well and resists crushing.
O
- Olefin
- Also called polypropylene. An inexpensive synthetic that resists fading and moisture, common in indoor/outdoor rugs.
- Oriental Rug
- A broad term for rugs hand-made across the “rug belt” — Iran, Turkey, the Caucasus, Central Asia, India, and China.
P
- Persian Rug
- An Oriental rug woven in Iran (formerly Persia), known for fine knotting and usually named for its city or region of origin, such as Tabriz or Kashan.
- Pile
- The raised, tactile surface of a rug formed by the knots or tufts. It can be low, medium, or high (shag).
- Pile Height
- How tall the pile stands. It affects how the rug feels underfoot, how much soil it traps, and how it should be cleaned.
S
- Selvage
- The bound, finished edge along the sides of a rug that keeps the outer rows of weave intact.
- Semi-Antique
- A rug roughly 40 to 80 years old — older than contemporary, but not yet a true antique.
- Shag
- A rug with long, deep pile. Wonderful underfoot, but a magnet for deep dust — which is why thorough dusting matters so much.
- Silk
- A natural protein fiber spun by silkworms — lustrous, strong, and delicate. It is always cleaned with low moisture and hand detailing.
- Sisal
- A stiff, durable plant fiber from the agave plant, used in natural-fiber rugs. Very water-sensitive.
- Soumak
- A flat-woven rug made by wrapping the weft to create a sturdier, slightly raised herringbone face. Unlike a kilim, it is not reversible.
- Symmetrical Knot
- The Turkish or Ghiordes knot, looped around two warps and pulled down between them. Durable and well suited to bold, geometric designs.
V
- Viscose
- A semi-synthetic fiber (a form of rayon) made from wood pulp to mimic silk’s sheen. Notorious for yellowing and texture loss when wet, so it is handled with great care.
W
- Warp
- The vertical foundation threads stretched on the loom. Knots are tied across them, and at the ends they become the fringe.
- Weft
- The horizontal threads passed over and under the warp to lock each row of knots in place.
- Wool
- The classic rug fiber, shorn from sheep. Naturally resilient, soil-hiding, and slightly stain-resistant — the workhorse of fine rugs.
Y
- Yarn
- Spun fiber, natural or synthetic, that becomes the warp, weft, and pile of a rug.