Quarterly Scientific-Research Goljaam

Carpet weaving is an indispensable part of artistic, economic, social, and cultural heritage of Iranian civilization. This industry has been long associated with the name of Kashan. In this study the role of attitude change in job culture and tendency to work outside home and do office work in carpet weaving industry in Kashan is investigated. A sample of 926 families participated in the study. Two instruments were used for data collection; a questionnaire and an interview. A significant correlation was observed between change in attitude towards working outside and several variables of carpet weaving (r=.289/ Sig. .01).

Special properties of Iranian wool such as elasticity compared with Merino wool leads to more popularity of Persian carpet at an international level. By using of finishing process it is possible to improve some of the physical properties of wool fibers such as fleece modification, increasing of lightness and whiteness and producing a smoother surface that result a better quality carpet. In this research influence of proteases on Iranian wool was investigated and variation in concentration and time was optimized. The results indicated that increasing of enzyme leads to increasing of loss of weight, strength and strain. With prolonged enzymatic processing it may obtain better whiteness, lightness, and bending. Changes in whiteness, bending and fineness and other properties such as weight loss, strength reduction and strain would be discussed.

Supply of any product is viewed an important element of production process. Lack of a product supply interferes with the production process and lead into serious damage in marketing the product in a competitive market. More specifically, due to unique characteristics of silk industry and silk such as small workshops, their spread over large areas, scattered consumers (carpet weavers), silk’s seasonal nature, being bulky, its decay, multiplicity of its preparation for final product (thread), and its low price requires due attention. In this article conceptual model of supply cycle by Sohal and its components are applied to investigate the present situation of supply cycle of silk threads. The main focus of the model is on improving management of supply cycle. A number of relevant hypotheses are tested. Rresults showed that factors such as location of the production and uncertainty of production have significant influence on supply cycle of the product.

The existing standards for measuring carpet properties consider carpet behavior after loading while its dynamic and instantaneous behavior is neglected. To investigate the dynamic behavior of under loading carpets, an INSTRON machine equipped with a developed system was used. The reliability of the system was verified by testing different materials. Different samples of hand-knitted carpet with 30, 40, 50, 60 and 70 Raj (rows/6.5cm), with specific structural and physical characteristic and raw material, were tested to obtain the curves of their pressure resistance versus time. The relation between features derived from the load/time curves and carpet structural and physical characteristics and raw materials were defined. Measuring the Pearson coefficient correlation, the linear correlations were studied and analyzed. The results indicate that with increase in knot density (Raj), the rate of decreasing thickness during loading, the resilience of carpet pile after loading, the total work exerted to carpet for reaching to jamming phase and the work returned by carpet during recovery phase decrease; while with increase in carpet thickness, the resilience and the total work increase. In addition, the load/time curves of different materials and hand-knitted carpets were compared. The similarities and differences between their behaviors were derived and the desirable compressibility behavior of a carpet is accordingly suggested.

The compilation of subject matter and data used in this article are extracted from library and recorded materials based on historical and pictorial sources to show changes in Kelardasht carpet within the past 100 years. Furthermore interviewing with masters in museums and bazaar was also used in accomplishing this article, and at the end data and pictures were compared to study the design and patterns of Kelardasht carpet in order to classify the patterns and motifs of these subjective and mental-woven carpets. Study of variations of patterns, motifs and colors in Kelardasht carpet shows that most of the patterns have been forgotten in the course of time and are not used any more. Then because this carpet is not a commercial one, difficult access to the area and entering poor patterns, this carpet was undermined or even defeated. It seems that the usage of old and original colors, original patterns and motifs and introducing genuineness and employed concepts in this kind of carpet to young people and buyers are important factors for the revival of Kelardasht carpets.

The aim of this research is assessing carpet weaver’s health needs and designing a model for meeting them. A sample of 1688 carpet weaver in 8 provinces (Azarbijan, Fars, Kerman, Markazi, Kordestan, Golestan, Mazandaran and Khorasan) has been interviewed for collecting research data. Findings show that a Persian carpet weaver in Iran is typically a thirty-one aged, married woman with three children who works seven hours a day. She has not another paid work and says that she weaves out of necessity. Regarding health habits, the research shows that 51% rest between work times, 14% exercise, 13% brush, 17% wash their hands with soap before dine and after going to toilet and only 6% use masks. Other results of the research indicate that health and medical facilities available for the population is not satisfactory in comparison to national rates. The carpet weavers' accesses to health and medical possibilities are as: 65% to physicians and medical centers, 79% to water supply, and 85% to bath. Also, 10% of them have social security insurance and 50% have rural medical insurance. 48% of respondents have attended health education programs and their information about issues of workshops' health needs and meeting them were satisfactory. 60% of workshops have other uses too, for example as kitchen, dining or guest rooms. 

One of major issues of the countries, especially developing countries, is expanding globalization process and the way of facing with it. Globalization is not a process that be encountered similarly in all countries but those who recognize its all aspects could utilize more and make better use of opportunities it makes; consequently, they could compete well in international community. Knowing competitive and comparative advantages of different sectors of country's economics can be a significant change to the rising of competitiveness. Since the hand-knitted carpet industry is one of the sectors that promise high non-oil export potentials, this paper concentrates on this industry and utilizes the Policy Analysis Matrix (PAM) to calculate indexes of competitiveness and comparative advantage in the hand-knitted carpet industry. As the province of Qom is one of the major producers of high quality marketable carpets, the paper concentrates on this area. The province has a long history of producing unique carpets in terms of design, weaving quality, coloring and other qualities. At present, Qom stands ready to supply the export market with enough of 65 knots hand-knitted silk carpets. So for evaluating trade globalization's effects on hand-knitted carpet industry, we use data and information about that kind of carpet in 1385. Results show that the index of the competitiveness of Qom hand-knitted silk carpets is 93% and its comparative advantage based on unit cost that would hold when Iran joins WTO is 84%. These indexes indicate that Qom hand-knitted silk carpets score high both in terms of competitiveness and comparative advantage.

Iranian carpet has an allegorical and symbolic sense of heaven and heaven-like gardens which is similar to the descriptions in the Holy Qoran, yet the existing plans and sketches in heaven-like carpets are proportionate to Iranian garden’s design and architecture (especially the Char-Bagh) in the way that it draws an everlasting picture of infinite world and heaven gardens in this world. In Islamic culture the growing path of human is from carpet to the empyrean, human beings come to the world on the carpet and fly to the empyrean and in its highest levels they lean on the best carpets made of silk in the heaven. Based on this research, it has been shown that an allegorical concept of heaven and its gardens in Iranian carpet can be found completely, which are full of Islamic gardens showing the high potentials of Iranian carpet designers in drawing and designing heaven’s spiritual concepts to weave the strings in a way that they deserve the holy concepts and remind us the everlasting heavens which ties us up to the infinite existence of it.

Tenth and Eleventh (A.H.) centuries are in line with resuming the glory and magnitude of Persian Art. Craftworks (handicrafts) including carpet, attained a great status and dignity comparing the past in the light of this revolution, and find a completely new place for itself. This important issue became a start and turning point in forming original patterns and models and creating new compositions in the design of the carpets and also strengthened the basis of the carpet designing for coming eras. It seems that such phenomenon was due to the novelties and innovations that occurred in the design and pattern of hand-knitted craftworks especially in relation to carpet and caused the prosperity of Safavid carpet. This article tries to investigate the ground and means of such innovation and revolution in the designs and patterns of the carpet of this golden era by providing internal and external indications in this regard.

Fars is one of the most important areas in kilim rugs and carpet production in Iran. Among the important reasons for variety and multiplicity of kilim rugs in Fars era, is the fact that here Turks and Fars people live together. This article has focused on the motif of Swastika or Broken Cross (Mehraneh in Persian) in these hands-knitted products. This paper aims to study the symbolic language of this motif through the time and its appearance in Qashqa’i carpets. Due to the multiplicity of the appearance of this motif, the current paper is not only concerned with the language of this symbol and its implications in Qashqa’i hand-kitted products, but also the role of Mehraneh through time in different cultures and religions. Some semiotic means have been employed herein. From viewpoint of the objective of the research, this is a fundamental one which explains the characteristics of this motif by exploring and discovering truths, realities and gaining knowledge about this motif. However, this paper is descriptive and historical for its nature and method. In other words, the common and general characteristics of this motif can be explained and orderly described by using original and referable documents and evidences. Also it will be possible to study their specifications, consider the relations of variables (if necessary) and recognize the characteristics of Swastika motif and its application in Qashqa’i carpets. The sources are visual, verbal and written.

The hunting & animal patterns is indeed one of the most important & effective motifs which can be seen in Persian Art since ancient times. For a long period of time, these motifs (which include religious & old mythological concepts, and tell about the geographical & natural human being environment, as well as his own desires, his domineeringness, and struggle for survival), have been designed & accomplished in various subjects and to their perfections by man of those ages in different arts. The importance of the hunting & animal motifs has caused these particular motifs to be repeated at any age. Meanwhile these repeated patterns have kept their own concepts & specifications regarding the variety of animals and compositions and at the same time have been rendered in innovative styles. This paper is trying to deal with one of the hunting & animals patterns in Persian Art namely: “Catch & Take” pattern. It also introduces some samples from the ancient ages till Safavid era, and finally the manifestation of these patterns from viewpoint of verity of animals & compositions have been studied in some carpets of Safavid era.

In Persian culture, carpet is the most important formal image expression of “Garden”, next to its architectural manifestation. Nowadays, while the historical gardens have already been destroyed by nature or man and lack of documents is dominant, garden’s representation in garden-carpets enables researchers to study the history of Persian gardens. This paper, analyzes Persian garden-carpet in order to re-think the Persian garden concentrated order, according to the theories of environmental psychology. Main purpose of this study is to find the relationship between “Persian gardens’ architectural order”, “Garden– carpets” and “Gardens’ effects on Man’s mental health” with emphasis on the Theory of “Environmental Ecological Perception”. Recognition of “perception-conception order” in Persian garden and garden-carpets is one of the results of this study. 

In addition to medical recognition applications, X-ray CT-scan images are increasingly found to have more innovative and widespread applications. Due to the ability of producing high resolution and high contrast images from soft tissues with low attenuation coefficients, the usage of X-ray micro-focus source, which has a very small focal point (in the range of micrometer), plays an important role in those new applications. Since employing non-original knots in hand-knitted carpet reduces the carpet quality and the originality of knots cannot be visually recognized, in this research, a method has been introduced for recognition of the 3D structure of hand-knitted carpet using CT-scan images provided by micro-focus X-ray source. The images obtained by inverse Radon transform can even show the smallest units in the inner structure of the finest hand-knitted carpets. This method is a powerful device to recognize the originality, to inspect the structure and to study the impacts of different parameters on the structure of hand-knitted carpets and also for other applications which need scrutiny of 3D textiles.

Proper and rational collecting, classifying and regular reporting of financial data in a manufacturing unit requires establishing an appropriate and compiled cost accounting data system so that based on these reports, the managers of the manufacturing units can make their decisions for planning, control of production and also cost reduction. Since the hand-knitted carpet industry is a competitor one, so a financial data system and especially a cost accounting system are required to preserve its situation in the marketplace and to plan for future. The objective of this research is to provide an appropriate template for determining the cost of carpet industry (hand-knitted carpets) to be employed in the cost accounting system. This will provide the necessary information for managers of the carpet manufacturing units. The material for this paper has been collected by library and field research methods including: learning the stages of carpet manufacturing, theoretical accounting fundamentals, and cost analysis templates research. The Delphi test method has been utilized and results have been presented to the specialists for review. A related questionnaire has also been provided along with the results to collect the reviewers’ opinions. This process has been followed until a common and stable result has been attained.

The hand-woven products indicate the identity and rich culture of our country, Iran. The weavers of “Bidgeneh village” have knitted faith and love in the warp and weft of their carpets. The Bidgeneh carpet, as one of the manifestations of high culture and art of Iran has been forgotten for many years. In spite of the long history of carpet-knitting in this village, there has been little research on the matter. In this paper, we have tried to revive this art by looking closer at the effective elements which involve in its formation. Initially we have shown that except a few disperse studies on the subject, yet there has not been done a full research on these carpets. Then we have studied pieces of the indigenous carpets and have carried out pathological studies for them. Finally, some methods have been recommended for upgrading and reviving the carpets of this region.

One of the most important factors resulting in outstanding qualities of Persian carpets is their designs. In designing a carpet, the important challenge is to strike a balance between preserving the cultural and artistic values of the design and it’s innovative. Using principles of visual arts, in this paper an attempt has been made to analyze genuine carpet designs and to identify their major features. These principles may guide designers to create new designs as genuine as the past masterpieces. The principles also may be used in evaluating the innovative designs, currently being used in Persian carpets. Applying these principles to some innovative carpet designs reveals that most of the unsuccessful designs suffer from lack of cultural values, and poor designing, composition and positioning. The paper also recommends some what-to-do and not-to-do for those carpet designs that are meant to be innovative.

As patterns of other Iranian handicrafts, carpet patterns are valuable and extensively rich sources of visual elements to be used in today’s graphical works whenever appropriate. Due to the fact that these patterns have paved a long way through the history of carpet-weaving, they have been evolved into distilled and beautiful patterns of precise and orderly design structures. It is a cultural necessity that graphics students be acquainted with these patterns and gain knowledge and expertise about them because using these patterns plays an important role in both increasing their visual literacy and creating cultural identity. Obviously, appropriate employment of these patterns requires both suitable knowledge of them and recognition of the right and opportune time of using them which in its turn, demands skill and experience of graphic designers while employing these patterns. In the case of lacking each of aforementioned items by designers, these patterns can not be used appropriately and their aesthetic and cultural aspects will be destroyed.

Design, color and pattern, which are of the carpet overriding esthetic elements, create identity for a carpet. Designers have been depicting the most beautiful and attractive pictures as the carpet design for the past centuries. The history of incorporating computer-based designs into carpets does not exceed three decades; therefore, it is a present-day technology adopted: In the similar vein, it has provided us with a wide range of possibilities. However, due to lack of interest in the widespread use of computer in many carpet-manufacturing procedures, it seems to have been faded into insignificance; therefore, an attempt should be made in order to overcome the challenges between traditional designing atmosphere by hand & that of computer. There are some unanswerable questions as follows: 1) does computer ruin the carpet design genuineness?; 2) is the presence of computer fundamentally necessary in this field?, and 3) will the relationship between an artisan and an apprentice break down when there are countless patterns & designs saved in the computer and there is no need for these manually-designed patterns to be learned & handed down. The method of research adopted here is a case study. In order to recognize each of the above-said methods in designing carpets, it was deemed necessary to study the history of formation of manual designing and the impact of computers in speeding up the production of carpet drawings. In addition, a comparison has been made between computer-aided drawings with that of manual ones. To do this, appropriate data was collected via library resources & interviewing great masters. The research revealed that each one of the manual & computer-aided carpet drawings have special specifications which have been contributed to their similarities & differences. Between them nevertheless, the computer-software stem from manual designing. The distinctive characteristic of computer in speeding up the production is that it is regarded important in both drawing and other fields related to carpet such as approximate calculations, weaving & marketing. It seems that the disinterest of traditional carpet designers in making use of computer has nothing to do with using a computer as a tool; in the other hand, another convincing reason shall be uncovered. It is of paramount importance to describe computer in carpet drawing correctly.

Persian carpet is a manifestation of all of our national arts. There are thousands of people working in this trade. These carpets are produced by efforts of so many workers and artists. Obviously, it is necessary to gain a good knowledge of precious carpets these days because due to good foreign market for them, unfortunately, these weavings with their exceptional designs have been exported abroad and there is almost no indication of them in Iranian artistic centers. Precious carpets are only presented in exhibitions and carpet shops and so often their artists and weavers fade into obscurity. Only few merchants and a number of particular persons know these people and even there can be no attempt to introduce them to art societies. This paper, beginning with a brief review of the history of Tabriz accompanied with the history of carpet-weaving in this area, introduces some designing and coloring techniques used for precious and high quality carpets of Tabriz and also their designers. Then it proceeds to present some characteristics of these carpets including: weaving method, used materials, colors and son on.

This article aims at studying the geometrical proportions of five types of most outstanding designs of Safavid carpets as one of the most important styles in carpet art of Iran. This research has been conducted using geometric methods of translation of measures and finding the basic module for identifying the proportions in carpets for to determination and comparison of modules with each other. Then the findings of the research have been compared with reference geometrical proportions of the Iranian geometry. Ultimately, the findings of this paper have been compared with special proportions present in decorative arts of the Timurids, Ilkhanid, and Seljuk periods, which possess special and specific proportions according to researchers, in order for determining the origin of this system of proportions. The results indicate that the carpets have general geometrical proportions. Such proportions include certain proportions between the pattern and dimensions of carpets.