Tradition woven into handmade rugs

Hakan Ucarer grew up in Konya, Turkey, watching his mother make rugs prized by collectors. It was the start of a lifelong fascination with the carpets and weaving traditions of the Middle East and nomadic tribes.

At 16 he started selling carpets in his village, and now does the same halfway around the world on Maui, where he has no shop but is sought by interior designers and upscale clientele. He found the carpets have a lot of local appeal, with colors that are bright and festive, fitting in nicely with Asian and tropical decor.

For two weekends he’ll be bringing his Global Caravan to Pegge Hopper Gallery, offering a collection of new and antique handwoven rugs in wool, silk and silk-wool combinations, in a range of sizes and prices from $300 to $10,000 to suit the cas­ual buyer and experienced collectors.

He’ll be welcomed with an opening reception today, and the event will continue during gallery hours through Aug. 3.

Ucarer hails from a long line of rug weavers, embedded in the centuries-old tradition of plant-dyeing and hand-knotting rugs and carpets.

But he’s concerned by the dwindling number of weavers. Although his mother and sister still make rugs, fewer families in the surrounding villages and neighboring countries can afford to uphold the time-consuming work.

"In Turkey there were once 1,000 villages making rugs. Today there are less than 90 villages making them," he said. "A lot of carpets are now being made in India, China, but the genuine Turkish rugs made by hand are hard to come by.

"The older they are, the better the dyes. They don’t fade, they don’t bleed. Every hundred years you get a different tone. The colors shift a little bit to become more pastel, more interesting."

The dyes were derived from plants, such as madder root, sage, onion and walnuts, "whatever was in the environment," Ucarer said. Some of the muted effects are a result of using undyed natural wool, goat and camel hair.

Among the pieces Ucarer is offering for sale is a rare 100-year-old Kurd­ish rug made entirely of camel’s wool. At 3-by-5 feet, it is priced at $3,000. A few other pieces he is offering date back 110 to 150 years.

"Many people buy them knowing they can pass them on to family and kids. There’s always a resale value if properly maintained."

Just last month, a nearly 9-foot-long 17th-century Persian carpet with a sickle leaf motif, owned by the Corcoran Gallery, sold for $33.7 million at Sotheby’s New York.

Ucarer admits he sometimes has trouble letting go of certain carpets.

"You can get so attached to something, and once it’s gone you may never see it again because they are one of a kind," he said. "But I get messages from people who say how happy they are and how much they love it, and that makes me happy.

"Every carpet has a story behind it, of a family, how they used it, how they cared for it. The energy it brings to a household is so amazing, and to think it made it halfway around the world from Turkey to Hono­lulu or Maui is amazing."