Handmade Waziri rug

This modern-tribal themed handmade Waziri rug will add punchy dynamism to wherever you lay it. 

It shows a chic grey main background shade with colourful pops in tribal emblems. These exciting colours include, turquoise, blue, navy, rust-red, green, ochre-yellow, brown, salmon and cream. 

The tribal-vibe design displays a theme of twelve motifs arranged in rows or columns along with a variety of smaller emblems, all surrounded by a border with geometric patterns. 

Some more information about this Handmade Waziri rug

This eye-catching rug was handcrafted in Afghanistan. The design and colours are particularly appealing and represent a fusion of modern and traditional. 

The design of this Afghan rug takes on a format commonly associated with the Afghan carpets of old. These typically displayed all over patterns of repeating motifs (known as guls) laid out in a uniform, regimented arrangement. These old-school Afghans were fairly limited in their colour palette to red and black. As you can see, from a colour point-of-view, this rug couldn't be more different!

This Waziri rug is named after an Afghan tribe. 

What it is made from

Like the majority of our rugs, this Afghan rug was made from wool and cotton. In the world of Oriental rugs, these are probably the two most used fibres. And for good reason, for hundreds of years wool and cotton have been proven to be hard wearing natural materials which are ideally suited for making Oriental rugs.

Wool was used to make the pile of this rug. Afghan wool is not only luxurious, but it's also incredibly hardy. If you think about it, it's the colourful wool that grabs our attention when we look at the rug; and from a tactile point-of-view, it's what we feel beneath our feet as we stride across it. 

Cotton is the other important element of this Afghan rug. It is not so noticeable. It does the hard work behind the scenes! Cotton yarns were actually the first material to be secured onto the loom before the weaving started. These are the underlying foundation fibres, also known as: the warps. If you navigate to our final picture, you will see the corner of the rug turned over - look closely at the fringes, because these are also the warp threads and they run right through the rug and out the other end. 

How this Afghan rug was handmade

Although this eye-catching Waziri rug has a modern vibe, it was still made by the same carpet weaving methods of a bygone era. 

The woollen pile was made by the technique of hand-knotting. An ancient technique, tried and trusted, and yet to be surpassed.

Put simply: each tuft of pile is made from a knot. The knots are strands of coloured wool which are tied onto pairs of warp threads. The knotting is carried out from side-to-side, in rows. Once a row is completed, a series of threads called wefts are woven betwixt the warps and compacted against the line of knots. This will be repeated over and over. The knots work in unison to create the colours and design of the rug. 

As you can imagine, in an Afghan rug like this there are thousands of knots - probably approaching half-a-million. 

Using this rug in your home

At just shy of 7x5, this rug is a useful size that can be placed in many different rooms in your home. It's interesting to look at and gives off a modern vibe, but it is also durable - so you can use it in a living room as a hearth rug or even as a welcoming statement piece in an entrance hall.

Key details:

• Country of origin: Afghanistan
• Size: 2.04×1.48m / 6’8″x4’10″
• Thickness: 7mm
• Pile: Wool, hand-knotted
• Warp: Cotton
• Age: New