S is for Silk

After we toured the ruins of Ephesus, we headed to lunch (I think!) and then we headed to Turkmen Carpets.

We were greeted by friendly folks who then gave us a demonstration of how the silk threads were made.

It was very interesting.

After the really cool silk thread demonstration, we were able to see another demonstration of how the carpets are made with double knots on each pass . . . or maybe triple knots??  In Egypt, there were children working in the factory. In Turkey, the employees seemed more age appropriate.

After the demonstrations, we moved to the showroom and they definitely put on a show.

First, we were served a choice of wine or raki (you can read about Raki on yesterday's post). Then these young men started throwing beautiful carpets out onto the floor and they did it with lots of flourish!

After the fancy show, we were told to shop and I knew exactly what I wanted . . . 

but when I saw the price tag for such a small rug, I just couldn't do it. The sales people were pretty persistent and I finally had to practically run out of the room!

It was a really cool experience and I'm sure the silk rugs are worth their price (you could haggle!) but I just couldn't justify spending that amount of money to put in a powder room.

Have you ever seen silk in its raw form? Have you ever been to a rug factory?