WGBH Featuring Noor Oriental Rugs

Cambridge business owner weaves through history By Gillian Rich Wicked Local Cambridge Posted May 10, 2010 @ 06:09 AM

Cambridge-On the floor of a Cambridge kitchen, lay a worn, tattered, and seemingly worthless rug. But it still caught the eye of Mohammad Nooraee, owner of Noor Oriental Rugs in Cambridge. The cream and black rug, it turns out, is an 18th century Persian rug, worth $15,000. Click here to see full story

Lexington - Kathleen and John Green Jr. have lived in Lexington since 1980, but their rug’s lifeline dwarfs that period.
The multicolored 1881 Persian Serapi rug, made from sheep’s wool, has seen better days. After the Greens gave it to their son in 2001, the rug faced a battle with the elements and lost.
So last September they called on the one man who could bring it back from the brink.  They called Mohammad A. Nooraee. Rug whisperer.

At his business, Noor Oriental Rugs, Inc. in Cambridge, Nooraee used 444 ancient techniques of authentic restoration. And last Friday, the Greens and their son’s rug were temporarily reunited.

“Restoration of a rug is more challenging than weaving a new rug because once we start weaving a brand new rug, I just use my own knotting system, my own roll and what I want to do,” said Nooraee. “But restoration, I need to think what someone has done since the 18th century and mimic his pattern and know what he has done and the method of knotting. Restoration is all about conceptualization.”

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