1068 | RARE BLUE BLOODED Antique Persian Karaja Rug with Midnight & Cobalt Blue | Circa 1910–1930 | 2.7 × 4.0

ABOUT THIS RUG

This blue has been waiting a hundred years for your beige living room.

Meet Blue Blooded—an antique Persian Karaja from Northwest Persia with a color palette that feels almost impossible for its age.

The field is a deep, saturated midnight indigo. Not faded navy. Not blue-gray.

Midnight.

Running straight through it are three geometric medallions, each doing its own thing. The upper and lower medallions erupt in extraordinary cobalt blue with brick-red centers, while the middle flips the script entirely—a dusty salmon-pink medallion floating against all that darkness.

Then the corners turn pink too.

Because apparently restraint wasn't on the loom that day.

Surrounding everything is a spectacular ivory border packed with angular, almost hieroglyphic-looking geometric forms in brown, blue and red. The contrast against the dark field is outrageous.

Midnight indigo. Cobalt. Salmon pink. Ivory. Tobacco brown. Brick red. Tiny flashes of ochre.

Find us a new rug with this palette. We'll wait.

Origin: Northwest Persia (Iran), attributed to Karaja / Karajeh in the greater Heriz weaving region
Age: Antique, likely circa 1910–1930
Construction: Hand-knotted wool
Size: 2'7" × 4'0"
Colors: Midnight indigo, saturated cobalt blue, salmon pink, ivory, brick red, tobacco brown & ochre
Design: Three geometric medallions on a deep indigo field with salmon corner spandrels and graphic ivory border

WHY WE LOVE IT

The blues are absurd.

There are antique Persian rugs with blue in them.

And then there's this.

The field drops into an almost bottomless midnight indigo while those electric cobalt medallions seem to sit right on top of it. Against all that blue, the salmon-pink center and corners shouldn't work.

They absolutely do.

It's the kind of color combination that makes you wonder how something woven roughly a century ago somehow looks more interesting than 95% of what gets designed today.

And look at the drawing.

Those medallions aren't perfectly centered. The outlines wander. The little motifs change shape. The ivory border twists its way around the rug with enough irregularity to make it unmistakably handmade.

There is rhythm here.

But perfection?

Wrong department.

CONDITION

Blue Blooded has survived remarkably well while retaining exactly the antique character we want to see.

There is age-related variation in the pile, handmade irregularity throughout, and visible wear along the ends and fringe consistent with an old village rug. The wool still carries tremendous visual depth, and most importantly, those extraordinary blues remain remarkably saturated.

Nothing has been artificially distressed to make this rug look interesting.

It put in the years.

Please review all photographs carefully, as they are considered part of the condition description.

STYLING NOTES

At 2'7" × 4'0", Blue Blooded is small enough to go almost anywhere and loud enough that nobody will overlook it.

Beside a bed.

In an entry.

At the kitchen sink.

In front of a console.

Under a little table.

In an office that desperately needs evidence its owner has a personality.

But we'd really like to see this one surrounded by restraint.

White plaster. Natural wood. Linen. Chrome. Travertine. Something aggressively contemporary.

Then drop a hundred-year-old Persian rug with midnight blue, electric cobalt and pink onto the floor.

Problem solved.

FINAL WORD

Some antique rugs are valuable because they're old.

Some because they're beautiful.

And every once in a while, you find one with colors that make you wonder how the hell they survived.

Blue Blooded is that rug.

Approximately a century old.

Four feet long.

Three medallions.

And enough blue to make everything else in the room look underdressed.

Good luck finding another one.