Balouch (Belouch)

The most dominant feature of the Belouch is the repeting pattern of highly stylized camel foot or pear shape medallions, surrounded by geometric borders. They have very geometric and intricate designs with a largely Turkmen influence.

Quality: The quality of Belouch rugs is high and they last for many years.

Size & Shapes: The Belouch rugs are usually small (3x2 to 6x4 feet). Large sizes are hard to find. The finished rugs are usually square in shape

Colour: Dark red or blue contrasted with splashes of white, yellow and orange. Powerful blues predominate, with ivory as the contrasting color.

Texture: Soft wool, thin, tight piles.

Foundation: Cotton is the material of choice for the warp (vertical threads around which individual knots are looped) for village weavers because it is both strong and less expensive than wool. However, goat hair still predominates as tribal warp material. The weft (horizontal strings) of the under structure may be either strong spun goat hair, camel wool or cotton.

Knots: Belouch weavers use the asymmetrical Persian knot almost exclusively. Knots tend to be small and tightly packed.

Price: Belouch rugs are in great demand and as such have relatively high prices.

Location: The province of Balouchestan, from where the tribes who make the rug have descended, borders the East and South of Kerman. The two important cities in this province are Zabol and Zahedan. Here Turkish tribes live in black tents and tend to their flocks much as they did a hundred or more years ago, relatively isolated from commerce, technology and the conveniences of the modern world. The rugs are painstakingly woven by hand, often taking many months to complete. When complete they are either used in the tents or are preserved as items of value to be traded during lean times.

Their migratory lifestyle has been largely unaffected by civilization and these simple people are unaware of the commercial markets around the world into which their charming artifacts are ultimately absorbed and prized as art. Camel wool is widely used as a field background color in the making of many Belouchi pile rugs. They tend to be smaller in size and incorporate the asymmetrical Persian knot.

Bazar in Zabol