What to Consider
While searching for a rug, you should consider the following: functional use, decorative appeal, condition, price & investment potential.
When choosing a rug you should take into consideration the level of traffic that it will have to cope with, its functional use. Rugs are designed to be used, even the best ones, but you might not want kids running all over the top of your silk rug or highly detailed Isfahan masterpiece. Fine rugs are best kept for the bedroom, the wall or a formal lounge area which does not see a lot of heavy traffic. Of course darker rugs are best at hiding stains but all quality wool rugs have a degree of natural stain resistance. Common sense would rule that an ivory-fielded rug is not a great idea of the dining room or entrance hall. Thickness is not necessarily an indication of how hard wearing a rug will be, most of the better quality Persian rugs are quite thin in pile-height, around 10mm. Often the better the quality wool and more knots per square inch the shorter the pile can be cut. Persian & Oriental rugs can last for decades with heavy traffic, the best indication of resilience is the quality (not density) of the knotting and the wool; your local Persian rug specialist should be able to point you to the rugs that you should avoid if there is likely to be heavy traffic.