About the Antique Rugs of the Future Project

 Sheep Breeds of Azerbaijan

 Shearing, Sorting, Washing, Carding, Spinning

 "The advantages of handspun yarn to machine spun yarn"

 Rediscovery of Ancient Natural Dyes		 Our Natural Dyestuffs

 Mordants

 Difference between synthetically and naturally dyed rugs

 Weaving and Finishing Steps

 Galleries of ARFP Caucasian Azerbaijani Rugs

 

Antique Afshan runner, Azerbaijan. 4st quarter 19th century. 570 x 125 cm (Approx. 18ft 8in x 4ft 1in) 

 A long, narrow, carpet made for the side seating platforms in a Caucasian house and used in the west as a corridor runner. The colours are dark and the split-palmette motifs have here become translated into heavy angular saw-edged motifs with distinctly zoomorphic characteristics. This motif is clearly related to that which appears in certain of the so-called Shield group carpets attributed to Shirvan, specifically those in the Musee des Arts Decoratifs, the Brooklyn Museum and the Gulbenkian Foundation, Lisbon.