Rug Repair? Who has tried it?

[Joe Lawrence Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close Joe Lawrence]

I am curious who has tried repairing a rug or textile? I know it’s not a simple task and most often should be left to the pros but there are some repairs we can make. I will start by saying this repair was extremely difficult for me to understand and without my wife’s guidance and help, I could not have done it.
The repair was done on an Afshar tent bag from late 19c to early 20c. A very large and heavy piece that had damage on on side. It took about one week to do and I am happy with the results for a layman.

[Frank Petruziello Member Find all posts View Profile Close Frank Petruziello]

Beautiful work Joe, looks great.

Here are a few of my projects before and after. Everything I have learned has come from Peter Stone’s book on rug repair. The last two I’m still working. As always the question is how far to go. I may have gone too far with the Turkish prayer rug. Am trying to be more strategic with the Facharlo. I’ve started at the top of the center medallion. I plan on repairing the holes and just enough re-knotting to make the design more important than the wear.

[Frank Petruziello Member Find all posts View Profile Close Frank Petruziello]

Missed a few photos

[Frank Petruziello Member Find all posts View Profile Close Frank Petruziello]

More recent of the Turkish prayer rug. I’m not happy with the brown at the bottom. Bad match but all I could find. Haven’t finished because of it.

[Joe Lawrence Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close Joe Lawrence]

Wow! Amazing and complex work!

100% wool is very difficult to find in colors that were used in Turkey and Central Asia. We even had a hard time finding 100% wool yarn in Turkey last year. Out of the 1000’s of examples in the stores, only a few were 100%.

[Joe Lawrence Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close Joe Lawrence]

Also the date from your prayer rug is 1248? (1832) wow.

[Frank Petruziello Member Find all posts View Profile Close Frank Petruziello]

I’ve always been suspicious of the date but for no concrete reason. My problem with the wool I use is the character of it not the color. I use Appletons, Waverly and Restoration Yarns. I can usually find the color but they tend to be too fine, dull, and evenly colored. The Restoration Yarn is the best but many times still looks too even and their colors are the very limited. The real restoration people custom dye their wool. Too much for me. Sometimes I will go over the newly knotted area with colored markers to give a slightly more correct tone or add verigation. Doesn’t work with indigo based dye as the color wears off on the knot node making a highlight that I can’t reproduce. Note the turquoise area in this photo. The new is a pretty close color match but the character is completely different.

[PaulSmith Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close PaulSmith]

I applaud the efforts I see here. I got as far as getting a copy of the august Peter Stone book, looked through all the techniques described therein, and determined that I would just secure edges and ends with stitching, do some selvage wrapping, and back holes with appropriately-colored fabric and stitch around the insult. All reversible. In the end, contemplating serious rug repair (foundation restoration, repiling, etc.), I decided have enough of that sort of fine handwork to do around my other obsessions, and so I passed my Peter Stone book on to a friend. I use Paternayan yarns for the stuff I've done--it's 100% wool, and they have quite a range of colors, but it probably also has the blessing/curse of too even color for someone really trying to make the repair invisible.

Cheers,

Paul

[Frank Petruziello Member Find all posts View Profile Close Frank Petruziello]

Here is an update on the repair I am doing on a Fachralo Prayer Rug. The work so far is primarily from the center red medallion up to the edge of the outer red ground. The before picture was with a phone camera. The after was taken by a good camera hence the better color. I would be interested in other’s thoughts on how far I’ve gone to fill in the wear. I know there are many that feel no repair should be done leaving the piece all original. Since this piece was so worn I found myself only looking at the wear and not the design.

Frank

[Joe Lawrence Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close Joe Lawrence]

Wow! Incredible work!!

[Frank Petruziello Member Find all posts View Profile Close Frank Petruziello]

Thanks Joe, what are your thoughts on whether to repair antique rugs or not?

[Chuck Wagner Administrator Find all posts View Profile Close Chuck Wagner]

Hi Frank,

For reference, should you ever embark on repair of a kilim, there is an excellent discussion on the topic in our archives:

http://www.turkotek.com/misc_00115/restoration.htm

Repair of piled pieces has not been addressed in a single article, that I am aware of. A few of our members have impressive repair skills and have remarked on the topic periodically during discussions on other topics. A search of the archies on repair-replated terms should fnd some of them. Vincent Keers, in particular,spent a lot of time testing vegetal and synthetic dyes and built up an inventory of various colored yarns for his pile repair work.

Regards
Chuck

[Joe Lawrence Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close Joe Lawrence]

Frank,

My thoughts about rug repair goes both ways. For the rare and valuable piece, I feel it’s best to leave it as is. This statement refers to the collectors and/or hobbyists. For the “normal” piece, a repair is fine. I find it perfectly acceptable to practice on pieces to learn the skills. Small repairs such as borders and fringes should be learned by all collectors which is the extent of my abilities.

[Frank Petruziello Member Find all posts View Profile Close Frank Petruziello]

Thanks for the info Chuck. I’ll check it out.

[Frank Petruziello Member Find all posts View Profile Close Frank Petruziello]

Thanks for the info Chuck, I’ll check it out.