Giving a Rug as a Gift: Sizes, Colors and Safe Choices

By Storied Rugs6 min read

A small vintage Hamedan rug with a cream field and red border rolled loosely and tied with a plain linen ribbon on a scrubbed wooden table by a winter window

A rug makes a good gift when it does not depend on the other person’s room. Choose a small one, a 2 by 3 or a 3 by 5, in a pattern with several colors, and it will find a place by a door, a bed or a reading chair in almost any home. Leave room-size rugs to people who choose them together, because size and color are too personal to guess.

A hand-knotted rug is a gift that gets used every day and lasts for decades, and no one else will own the same one. Wool suits that kind of use, because its fibers stretch and recover without breaking.^[1]

A small Asadabad mat with a dusty rose field, a teal diamond and a dark navy border on honey pine boards beside a made bed, with a rush chair, a basket and an oak bedside table by the window — An Asadabad, 2 feet by 2 feet 11 inches, beside a bed. A dusty rose field with a teal diamond at its center sits inside a dark navy frame, and a mat this size fits beside almost any bed.

What a rug given as a gift means

Fine carpets have long had a place at important occasions. In Venice, the most important record of the diplomatic exchanges between the Safavid shahs of Persia and the doges is a group of silk and silver-thread carpets.^[2] They were draped in front of the high altar of San Marco during religious festivals.^[2]

Weavings also marked weddings. Among the Turkmen, the bride rode to her new home on a camel dressed in an asmalyk, a decorated trapping.^[3] She wove its ornaments herself, to show her skill.^[3]

We know of no single fixed meaning for a rug given as a gift, and we would rather not invent one. What the history does show is that people have long chosen carpets for the moments they wanted remembered, from diplomacy to weddings.

Choose a size that does not depend on their room

A room-size rug has to fit the furniture, the doors and the walkways of one particular room. That is hard to guess for someone else, so keep those for a couple choosing together. A small rug only has to fit a patch of floor, and every home has one.

A 2 by 3 is the safest gift of all. It goes beside a bed, inside a back door, in front of a kitchen sink or across a bench. Browse the mini and accent rugs.
A 3 by 5 suits a front door or the space under a reading chair. Our post on where to put a small rug lists ten places it works.
A runner is a good gift only if you know the hall. Ask for its length, or measure it on your next visit, and check our guide to choosing a runner’s length.

Vintage rugs rarely match their size names exactly, so read the listed width and length rather than the label. Our page on Persian rug sizes explains the usual names.

A faded Isparta runner with a soft plum field, a pale blue and white medallion and a denim blue border on light oak boards in a short hallway, an oak console table with a jug and bowl on one side and a bench, basket and shoes on the other — An Isparta runner, 2 feet 11 inches by 6 feet 1 inch, in a short hall. Its faded plum field, framed in denim blue, is soft enough for a pale home, but a runner makes a safe gift only once you know the length of the hall.

Colors that suit most homes

A rug with one strong color asks the room to agree with it. A rug with four or five colors in its pattern almost always finds something to agree with. So for a gift, look for a mix, such as red with cream and blue, or rose with navy and teal.

Faded colors are the other safe bet. A red that has softened toward rose over fifty years sits more easily in a modern room than a full-strength red. Our post on why vintage colors age so beautifully explains how that happens.

If you know the home, use what you know. Think of their sofa first, then their walls. Our posts on what color rug goes with your couch and what color rug goes with your walls give pairings for each common color. Very pale homes usually take a cream or rose rug better than a deep red one.

Who should not get a small rug

A small rug is the wrong gift for someone at risk of falling. The National Institute on Aging advises older adults not to use throw rugs or small area rugs.^[4] It also advises that carpets be fixed firmly to the floor so they will not slip.^[4] For a grandparent who is unsteady on their feet, a rug for the wall is a kinder idea, and our guide to hanging a rug on the wall shows how.

For everyone else, give the rug a pad. A thin felt and rubber pad, cut a little smaller than the rug, stops it sliding on a smooth floor. Rug Pads 101 explains which one to buy. For a baby’s room, read choosing a rug for a nursery or kids’ room before you pick one.

A small Tabriz rug with soft panels of cream, teal, gold and pink lying crosswise on gray slate tiles in a front entry, in front of an oak bench with a basket, a peg rail with a coat and a slatted shoe rack — A Tabriz, 3 feet by 4 feet 6 inches, inside a front door. The field is divided into soft panels of cream, teal, gold and burgundy, so it has something in common with almost any entry.

What a rug gift costs

A small vintage rug is also one of the more affordable ways to give something handmade. About half of the rugs on our site cost under $500, and most of the mini and small ones fall between about $250 and $420. Start with the rugs under $500.

Every rug we sell is hand-knotted wool pile on a cotton foundation, about fifty years old, and washed and restored before it is listed. That last part matters for a gift. The person who opens it can put it straight on the floor.

Sending a rug as a gift

Shipping is free to the US and Canada, and customs duties are included for US orders. Our shipping and returns page has the details. Returns are accepted within seven days of delivery (fourteen in the European Union), and that clock runs from the day the rug arrives. If you send it straight to the recipient, tell them that, so they can say early if the size is wrong.

Rugs travel folded, and a fold line or a lifted corner is normal when the box is opened. Our post on how to flatten a rug is worth passing on with the gift. If you wrap it yourself, roll it loosely and tie it with ribbon or cord. Keep tape off the rug, because adhesive can be hard to get out of wool.

For a December gift, a red rug laid in front of the tree does double duty, and our post on a rug under the Christmas tree covers sizes for that. Otherwise, start with the mini rugs and pick one with a few colors in it.