Chinese Rugs

Compared to rugs from the other great rug making traditions of the world, such as Persia, Turkey, and even the Southwestern United States, Chinese rugs tend to not be as immediately appealing to most people.  In contrast to most other rugs, Chinese rugs present less of a unified composition and tend to make more use of symbols.  Where other cultures will use geometric patterns and maybe plants such as flowers to create a design and provide meaning, Chinese rugs most often feature depictions of actual objects and living things, even using stylized characters to convey a literal meaning like good fortune or longevity.  Color choices in Chinese area rugs are also often unconventional when compared to rugs from other regions of the world.  This is true even antique Chinese rugs, which commonly featured colors including white, red, yellow, blue, and fawn.  Boundaries between colors are often "sculpted", which distinguishes areas by texture as well as color.  In construction, too, Chinese wool rugs differ from Persian rugs in that they have a lower knot count and use a 5-ply yarn as opposed to 2-ply.  Chinese rugs are graded by 'line count', which means the number of knots per line, per foot long section.  One calculation shows that a 9 by 12 Chinese rug with 90 lines is made up of more than 10 miles of warp and weft threads, and that's not including all the yarn used for knots! 

What do you look for in a Chinese rug?  Common design elements contain a simple, wide border which may feature geometric designs such as fretting.  This border contains the main portion of the rug, which often features medallion designs.  The designs are not integrated; rather, they occupy their own space.  Motifs may also be used, for example the word for "bat" in Chinese contains a sound that is a homonym for the world "luck" or "prosperity", and is included on the rug for that purpose.  Keep in mind that Chinese culture is very big on prosperity and wealth, and that these are the most appreciated aspects of life (in contrast to more abstract qualities like freedom and beauty).  Chinese rugs use very literal means to incorporate these qualities into symbolic form on the rugs, so these may be the rugs for you if you like designs that have a bit of a good luck charm feeling to them.  It's also not unusual to find a rug with a nice flower design (nature) side by side with the more graphic bats, butterflies, dragons, etc, so even if such literal symbolism is not your thing, you might find the other design elements of a Chinese rug appealing.   
The background of Chinese oriental rugs often consists of peonies, symbol of nobility, value, and also fertility.  Stylized leaf patterns are also used for backgrounds that are not just one solid color.

In another category when it comes to price as well as quality, Chinese silk rugs have a look and feel all their own and are highly prized by collectors around the world.  Because of the extremely labor intensive way of procuring silk, which involves raising silkworms fed on a diet of mulberry leaves, boiling the cocoons, then finally unravelling the silk cocoons into spools of silk for weaving, silk carpets fetch much higher prices.  But the finished product is one that has no equal in terms of the, well, silky texture as well as strength and shimmering colors.  A silk rug can be expected to last a very long time, as silk is a very durable material.

Another category of rugs from China that are not rooted in Chinese culture, but have more to do with the rugs being made there, are Chinese art deco rugs.  In the 1920s through the mid-thirties, production in China was cheap as it is now, prompting the art deco rug makers of the time to get manufacture their goods in China.  These rugs featured bright colors such as lapis blue in the place of the soft blue of tradtional Chinese rugs, with novel uses of traditional and new Chinese motifs incorporated in a distinctly art deco manner.  The two most famous rug companies from this period, named after their makers, are the Fette and Nichols rugs, still considered to be representative of a unique time in history and a unique and vibrant style of rugs.  The Fette style of Chinese area rug, due to the thinness and pliability of the cotton warp used, were soft and supple compared to the Nichols rugs that utilized 'Nichols Super Yarn', which was machine spun and had considerable strength.  This, in combination with the strong cotton used in the foundation of the rug, resulted in a product that was dense and heavy. 
Although these rugs are difficult to incorporate into many living rooms today because of the uni-directionality of their designs and bright colors, they are still sought after by many who appreciate the design of these special rugs.