Berber Kelim | 300 x 250 cm | Nr. Z-3038

Mottled Berber Kelim, light brown with stripes

Origin	India
Dimensions	300 cm x 250 cm (= 7.5 m²)
Construction	hand-woven
Material	Weft (pile): wool (hand-spun, natural dyes) Warp: cotton
Pile height	15mm
Year of manufacture	2024
Colour	Light brown, beige
Edition	one-of-a-kind piece

 

Origin

Kelims (also Kilim, Qilim) were traditionally made for the weavers' own use only. Nomads and farmers used, and still use, their flat-woven Kelims as rugs on the floor, but also as tent or wall hangings, blankets, cushions or bags. With our new Kelims we have developed the traditional Iranian weaving technique further, so we can make Kelims that are noticeably firmer and thicker. Unlike conventional Kelim rugs, they are therefore wonderfully cosy, soft and well padded. We call this new generation of Kelims the Berber Kelim. The wool for our Berber Kelims is first dyed, as required, and then combed by hand into a fairly coarse yarn. The rug is then woven from that yarn, which is what gives it an extraordinary texture and makes it a perfectly cosy rug.

 

Pattern

The surface of this Berber Kelim looks mottled. The shifts in hue and the light-and-dark shading of the pile yarn make the colours shimmer and keep the rug forgiving of dirt. These so-called colour variations, known as abrash, give the rug a livelier look. The mottling comes about because the wool of this Berber Kelim was hand-spun. During dyeing, the natural dyes are taken up to differing degrees.

The straight stripes of this Berber Kelim order and structure the pattern.

The clear, abstract design of this contemporary rug speaks especially to people who love clean, modern interiors and architecture. The design idea for this rug comes from Europe. Free from the rules of traditional rug patterns, it was developed for Western art and interior design. This is not an entirely new development. The roots of European rug design go back to Art Deco rugs that were made to Western specifications between the late 1920s and the 1950s.

The background of this Berber Kelim is light brown.

 

Material

The technique used to make the materials for the pile of this Berber Kelim is over 200 years old. The wool was dyed with natural dyes and spun by hand. Dyeing with natural or plant dyes is more complicated, more expensive and more time-consuming than dyeing with chemical colours. For a glowing red, for example, you need around one kilo of ground madder root as dye for every kilo of wool. For a strong yellow that isn't too pale, it even takes two kilograms of the dye weld per kilo of wool. Spinning the wool is time- and labour-intensive too. And fewer and fewer people still master the art of spinning wool by hand.

But the effort is worth it: dyeing with natural colours lets the high-quality wool keep its natural lanolin content. The wool dyed with natural dyes and spun by hand creates fascinating, shimmering patterns. The charm of hand-spun wool, with its slight irregularities and natural shades, unfolds as a contrast in modern interiors, but equally in rooms furnished more traditionally or in country style.