The history of carpet weaving in Tabriz goes back to the era before the Safavid period. In the second half of the 15th century, the carpet turned from a rustic state into an advanced art that reached the court, and after that it reached the peak of development and prosperity.
The region of Azerbaijan has always benefited from a special gift in the production of carpets due to having vast pastures of agricultural lands and suitable climates. This city has a special prestige and position among all the carpet weaving centers in Iran, and the reason for this prestige is both in terms of environmental characteristics and because of the history that the Tabriz carpet has with it….
During the Safavid period, the art of carpet weaving reached its peak in Tabriz, which owes this progress to the large workshops where the first class weavers of Iran were gathered to weave exquisite carpets.
In the book Rugs and Carpet of the World, we see another theory about the Tabriz carpet. In this theory, the history of the weaving of medallion or tangerine carpets is related to the early years of the 16th century. This period is almost symmetrical with the reign of Shah Ismail I and Shah Tahmasab According to the author, the carpets of this period have slim designs and animal and human motifs
In this book, the author has tried to attribute some of the carpets in the museum of the world to the first half of the 16th century and to the weaving workshops of Tabriz, which can be considered the peak of the art and the flourishing of the art of carpet weaving in this period.
From the second half of the 19th century, Tabriz carpets were exported to Tabriz merchants to Istanbul and then to European countries. At the end of the Qajar period and the beginning of the Pahlavi period, the introduction of Iranian carpets to the world markets expanded further, and this caused the globalization of the name of Tabriz carpets.
Today, the carpets left from the Safavid era adorn museums around the world and have preserved the name of Iranian art in the world.