(Connoisseur-Caliber) This wonderfully preserved nearly 150-year-old Serapi offers an inimitable elegance and quality of craftsmanship that usually is associated with Persian Town rugs. Creating an exquisite original ambiance, an intuitive aesthetic sensitivity in the drawing indicates this piece’s renowned village tradition. The magnificent eight-petalled medallion features well-articulated palmettes and a starflower holding at its pale rose center a single offset floret, all profoundly accented by tenuously connected pendants. No part appears compressed or crowded, expressing the style’s relaxed spaciousness. The expertly striated reserve magically shifts from a time-softened pomegranate to a warm watermelon red, the color of these fruits capturing inspiring dawn hues from this mountain weaving center while azure to cerulean blues in the spandrels evoke expansive depth.