You can read Emmett’s rug book, which focuses on new Oriental rugs, here on the Oriental Rug Blog. Or you can spring for a hard copy and enjoy the beautiful color prints as they were meant to be seen. Give us a call at 1-888-811-RUGS to order a copy. It’s also available at Amazon.
Here are other comprehensive rugs books about Oriental carpets, though you should note that, like most rug books, the ones I’ve cited focus on antique rugs.
Murray L. Eiland Jr. and Murray Eiland III, Oriental Carpets: A Complete Guide Guide (Bullfinch 1998). This book, researched and written by my brother and my nephew, is as close to being the final word on Oriental rugs as it is possible to be at this time. In this edition the work has matured to become not only authoritative, inclusive, and well written, but beautiful as well.
Joyce Ware, Official Price Guide of Oriental Rugs (2nd edition 1996). Though its title is misleading — there really is no such thing as an official price guide to Oriental rugs — and though the book’s production is not lavish, Joyce Ware communicates in it her deep understanding of Oriental rugs. The book is full of excellent information and quite inexpensive.
Jon Thompson, Oriental Carpets: From the Tents, Cottages and Workshops of Asia (New York 1993). Despite its picturesque but now politically incorrect cover photo of young Turkmen girls weaving (the book was published in 1983, before today’s sensitivity to child labor), this best-selling general guide to Oriental rugs is pure fun. Plenty of good color photos of rugs and rugmakers, tents and nomads, shepherds and stark landscapes make Oriental rugs irresistible.
