Alix G. Perrachon Explains How Rugs Define Living Spaces

If you think of a rug as an afterthought in your home decor, you're missing out on what can be the most effective focal point of a room, says rug expert Alix G. Perrachon.

Alix first discovered her passion for rugs while living in Turkey soon after college. Her first career was as an editor at some of the industry's leading specialty publications including the London-based magazine for collectors HALI: The Oriental Rug Journal of Oriental Carpets & Textiles, The Oriental Rug Magazine and AREA Magazine published by the Oriental Rug Importers Association. As a writer, her work on rugs and antiques has been published in House & Garden, Art & Auction, Antique Collector, Art & Antiques and the New York Times, among other publications. In 2010 she wrote the lavish book, The Decorative Carpet: Fine Handmade Rugs in Contemporary Interiors published by the Monacelli Press, a division of Random House. It showcases the work of leading interior designers who often start with the rug and literally build the rest of the room's décor from the ground up.

In 1991, Alix added a new dimension to her work by founding Alix Unlimited, a customized shopping service for handmade oriental and decorative carpets. Working with interior designers, architects and private clients, she draws on contacts around the world to source the most exquisite range of rugs, from antique oriental and European carpets to vegetable-dyed reproductions of traditional rugs created by artisans in countries such as India, Pakistan, Egypt, Armenia, China, Turkey and Afghanistan. Alix, a member as the ASID Connecticut chapter, offers an in-home consulting service and will take her New York area clients to Manhattan's finest rug showrooms. In helping them select handmade rugs, Alix guides them toward quality, value and esthetics—her three essentials. Moreover, she highlights the importance of opting for a handmade rug made from organic materials, which she says is really the ultimate "green" floor covering.

TotalHousehold caught up with Alix at a design seminar at the Mark Twain Library in Redding, CT. She shared her 30 some years of knowledge in the rug business with us.

TotalHousehold: What gave you the idea to start the Alix Unlimited service?

Alix G. Perrachon: Shopping for a handmade carpet can be a daunting experience for those not accustomed to the cliquish world of rugs. The rug market is becoming so trendy—it's hard to sell a rug that was popular only three years ago.

TH: How do you begin to look for styles?

Alix: Clients will tell me size and colors they're looking for and show me pictures for inspiration—or say something like, "I saw it on page 135 of this book--that’s what I want." The designers who know me know my sources and know where they want to go. I'll prep with photos before we go shopping, make sure showrooms have stock—there's a lot of background homework, though it's online work now. Today we go through websites—it used to be catalogs.

TH: What's in vogue these days?

Alix: Two thirds of the time, people want fashionable and trendy, but not cheap. In the '90s a far greater clientele wanted the then trendy Aubussons and needlepoints and antique and investment value carpets. With the recession in 2009, the whole concept of investment disappeared. Though there's definitely been an uptick in antique rug sales, the trend in the New York tri-state area has been toward transitional and contemporary rugs. Designs are simpler and more casual and many are avant garde. Silver blue grays are the hot colors of today. Ikats and Moroccans, hugely popular only two years ago, are still in demand, but seemed to have peaked. Trends are also geographically linked. Antiques and traditional new rugs are always in demand in New England and the Midwest, for instance.

The stylized central medallion in this early-20^th century East Turkestan Khotan relates to the shape of the sunburst convex mirror above while its stylized floral motifs and soft gold field find a new incarnation in the upholstered chairs.

TH: When is the decision about a room's rug typically made?

Alix: Most designers prefer to start with a rug because it can be the genesis of everything else—everything flows from it. In fact, two-thirds of the time we're starting with a rug, even when the rug is going to be custom-made. And that’s evolved over time—when I started my business in 1991 I'd get packets of fabrics in the mail with a note that said, "Find me a rug that goes with this."

However, with the variety available today, if you have fabrics you want to work with, there's no need to start with the rug—there's enough out there to choose. You can also custom virtually anything today if you can wait six to nine months.

TH: Where are the great rug artisans located now?

Alix: First of all, let me just say that I appreciate your use of the term "artisan" that connotes the level of artistry that goes into weaving rugs, which most people are unaware of. In the last 20 years, countries of origin have changed as labor pools shift. Some countries that were big sources in the '90s, such as Romania, are no longer a factor as costs of labor skyrocketed and the art of weaving has virtually disappeared there. In the last 5 years, costs both of labor and materials have escalated across the board in every rug producing country including in China, India, Pakistan and Nepal. In China, for instance, it's becoming increasingly challenging for manufacturers there to maintain their weaving staff as many chose to move into the higher-paid high-tech sectors. During the last 15 years, Nepal has emerged as a major source of transitional and contemporary rugs. Prized Tibetan rugs are so named because they were first woven in Nepal by Tibetan refugees who were fleeing from the Mao-led takeover of Tibet in the 1950s. Now, the weavers who make them are primarily Nepalese, but there are also Indians and others creating them. It is one of the top sources for hand-knotted custom carpets as they are produced in large factories with good-to-excellent quality control. It's important to also note that the country of origin is not in itself a guarantee of quality. This is a function of the manufacturer and importer and of their ability to establish reliable quality control.

You might be surprised to hear that Afghanistan is emerging as a source of beautiful high-end rugs. Each production is specific to an importer, and there's limited supply—their highest-end production can be more expensive than antique rugs.

TH: What are your cautions about buying a rug without an expert?

Alix: Buying a rug is like buying a diamond ring—without guidance you can make a big mistake. Look for as trustworthy a retailer as you can find in your community. Stay away from going-out-of-business liquidation sales, church sales, itinerant auctions, and itinerant dealers—stuff that’s dumped because they can't be sold. Also stay away from online rug sales!

An extraordinary silk Tibetan rug, conceived by Botero, displays an impressionist-style design. An artistic as much as decorative statement in this elegant Manhattan living room, the nuanced blues, corals and golds, which were achieved with all-natural dyes, are softly echoed in the walls and furnishings, and complement the bold 20th-century art collection above, including a fauvist landscape.

TH: What are your best tips for starting the hunt for that perfect rug?

My biggest recommendation is to do your homework. With the variety of what's out there, it's more important than ever. Here are a just a few tips:

Measure for the space that you want to cover. There are no hard-and-fast rules for size, but make sure the rug is balanced in the room—not too small or too large.

Look at photos online and in shelter magazines. This will give you a sense of what's on the market and see what you like design- and color-wise. I do think reading The Decorative Carpet: Fine Handmade Rugs in Contemporary Interiors is a very helpful step, not just because I wrote it (!), but mainly because it features invaluable rug decorating tips from 32 of North America's most prestigious designers in addition to practical buyer's information. Oriental rug books are wonderful, but they can be off-putting to the new rug buyer as they are more geared to collectors. The rugs in the photos are mainly rare collector pieces that have little to do with what's available in today's market.

Go to established respected retailers. Then ask to be shown the different rug types and price points. Most retailers will let you try at home—for a day or two—several rugs on approval just to see how they look in your space. I recommend trying three to five rugs. If you feel none works, don't feel obligated to buy. Just keep on looking!

Do NOT buy rugs online. I can't stress this enough. Looking at photos of rugs online can be an invaluable learning tool, but you absolutely need to see and touch a rug before you buy it. Photos can be misleading—even the most professional photographers are challenged. Photos can't capture the subtle variations in a rug, how it looks from one direction (light side) and the other (dark side), for instance, nor the quality of its materials, e.g., wool, silk, and cotton.

Last but not least: Buy what you like. Try to buy the best quality of what you can afford. Contrary to what you may think, quality does make a huge difference in terms of esthetics, longevity and maintenance. Buyer beware: A cheap, poor-quality can cost you more in the long run because it's basically disposable and will need to be replaced more quickly.

About The Book.

Alix's book, The Decorative Carpet: Fine Handmade Rugs in Contemporary Interiors, is the first book to consider decorative carpets as an integral component of interior design. In it, she explains how to choose a handmade rug and why, with accessible language and beautiful color images, to help you overcome feeling intimidated by rugs' foreign names and their mysterious-seeming origins.

The inspired designs are a glowing tribute to the talents of the carpet weavers and interior designers who enable a space to become a home. You are able to see how important the rug is to an interior and how its placement is essential to the harmony and flow of the rooms.

This book also provides professional advice on rug-buying; reveals the twenty most popular types decorative rugs in use today, along with a brief history of each; rug care and repair essentials; and a glossary of rug terminology. It has a foreword by legendary dealer Doris Leslie Blau, the founder of the prestigious Manhattan Doris Leslie Blau Gallery, which supplies rugs and carpets to top interiors and private clients.

Alix explores the use of handmade carpets by showing how celebrity interior designers have used them to create a fully composed interior. Penny Drue Baird, Clodagh, Jamie Drake, Thomas Jayne and Juan Montoya are just a few of the designers included. A wide array of beautiful handmade rugs is featured from Art Deco to Aubusson and Tabriz to Tibetan and Moroccan.

The Decorative Carpet is a practical as well as an enticing visual resource for designers, their clients and individual homeowners. The 9-by 11-inch volume features 256 pages and 200 color illustrations. This coffee table book is published by The Monacelli Press, an imprint of Random House; $50 hardcover. Starting at midnight EST on Monday January 27, you can enter to win a copy!