What’s the difference between a hand tufted rug and a hand knotted rug?
This is a difference that lies in the pile of the rug.
Hand Knotted Persian Rugs
After the warp and a certain number of weft are woven, the “plush” of the rug is added onto this structure. A small piece of material, usually wool yarn (but can also be silk or cotton), is woven through a specified number of warps and wefts, forming a knot. It is the ends of this knot that form the pile. Different coloured pieces of yarn are used to achieve the predetermined design. The formation of this knot depends on the weaver creating the rug, and can be symmetrical or asymmetrical in appearance. Once knots cover the desired amount of warp and weft, the warps are wrapped with yarn at the edges to bind them. Fringes may be made by simply gathering bundles of warp ends together and knotting them.
Generally, a hand knotted rug requires much more time and is more labour intensive than its tufted counterpart. As a result, these aspects are reflected in the price.
Hand Tufted Rugs
Most of the world’s hand tufted rugs are from China and India. Traditional rugs of Iran and the surrounding area are almost always hand knotted. One may be able to find hand tufted Persian rugs, but these are usually not actually from Iran. The only “Persian” thing about these rugs are the designs.
To create a hand tufted rug, we start with a piece of cloth attached to a frame that serves as the backing. Pieces of yarn are then inserted into the cloth backing by a handheld tufting tool, creating a pile that is comprised of looped yarn.The backing is coated in latex and then another secondary backing is attached. The surface of the pile is sheared and the edges of the rug are bound to prevent unraveling.
Hand tufted rugs are far less time consuming to make, since there isn’t any warp and weft structure or attaching the pile by knotting it on. They tend to be mass produced since they easier to make. As a result, they are generally less expensive.
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