CIRCA: early 1900’s
A beautiful three mandala carpet with uncommon abstract main border motifs. The three mandalas, each with a subtle abrash evident in the varying shades of blue, adorn the camel coloured center field, while each of the four corners are anchored with a ‘staircase-like’ stylised wave pattern. It has an inner secondary border of pearls while the main outer border features and unusual abstract design not often seen in Tibetan carpets.* The pile is full throughout and the dyes appear to be all natural, although the pink may be debatable. If it is, then certainly not the ‘hot’ pinks seen in many aniline dyed carpets. Both the warp and weft (and pile) are of hand-spun wool. Overall length of the carpet is 150cm including 8cm of red nambu cloth at either end. Actual carpet pile length is 136cm (the pile ends are intact, the carpet has just been ‘extended’ with the cloth addition). It is from the early part of the 1900’s, there are no repairs and is in overall excellent condition.
*A similarly designed carpet – one of the very very few seen published – but from the 19th century can be found on page 54, Figure 18, in the book Discovery of Tibetan Rugs; The Claudio Mariani Collection.