Silk Rugs

Silk is the only fibre that does something wool genuinely cannot — and it is the fibre most often faked, because the price difference makes faking it worthwhile.

What silk does

Fineness. A silk filament is far finer than a wool fibre, which allows knot densities wool cannot reach — 500 to over 1,000 knots per square inch. That is what makes the extraordinarily detailed drawing in fine Persian Qum and Isfahan work possible.

Directional lustre. Silk reflects light along the fibre, so a silk rug changes colour as you walk around it or as the light moves. Viewed from one end the field reads deep and saturated; from the other, pale and luminous. Nothing else does this.

Colour depth. Silk takes dye more intensely than wool, giving a saturation wool cannot match.

What it costs you

Silk is a display fibre. In a low-traffic room, a study, a bedroom, or on a wall, it is extraordinary. In a hallway it is a mistake.

The substitutions

This is where the money is, so this is where the deception is.

Viscose — sold as art silk, artificial silk, bamboo silk, banana silk or sari silk — is regenerated cellulose. It has silk's lustre and none of its properties, and it degrades badly. It is the single most complained-about fibre in the trade. See viscose rugs.

Mercerised cotton — sometimes called "Turkish silk" — is cotton treated to give it sheen. Common in Turkish tourist production around Kayseri.

Silk highlights in a wool rug are an honest and good use of the fibre: small accents that catch the light in a durable wool ground. Common in Nepalese work.

Two non-destructive checks: genuine silk feels warm rather than cool to the touch and makes a faint rustle when rubbed, and a silk rug's fringe is usually a continuation of the silk warp rather than a separate cotton fringe sewn on.

Buying

Establish the fibre before anything else — the price gap between silk and viscose is a factor of ten or more for rugs that look similar in a showroom.

Then get it in writing on the invoice: "silk pile on silk foundation", or whatever the truth is. Verbal claims about fibre are not recourse.

Expect fine silk production from Qum, Isfahan, Hereke and Kashmir. Expect the price to reflect a year or more of one person's work at those densities — see hand-knotted rugs and rug prices.

Care

Professional only, always. Silk loses strength when wet and can shrink and lose lustre permanently with the wrong treatment. Vacuum with suction on the lowest setting, blot spills with a dry cloth and nothing else, and keep it out of direct sun.

See rug cleaning for method by fibre.

Establishing that it is silk at all

Three quite different materials are sold under the word, at prices spanning two orders of magnitude. Real silk, art silk and mercerised cotton separates them and gives the four tests.

The burn test is the conclusive one and it needs a single fibre from the fringe. Silk is protein — it smells of burnt hair, self-extinguishes, and leaves a brittle bead that crushes to powder. Viscose is cellulose and smells of burning paper. Any dealer selling a genuinely silk rug will permit the test, because it settles the question in their favour; reluctance is itself the answer.