Oh, antique rugs, how great thou art.




From his first glimpse of the brightly colored rugs hanging on a neighbor's balcony in his hometown of Ramallah, Palestine, Rumzi Kaoud has had a lifelong love affair with the artistic talent displayed by hand-knotted rugs. After graduating from the elite Friends School, young Kaoud followed others in his family to the United States, making his home in New Haven, Connecticut. There he followed his passion and started a rug business with his brothers, finding a receptive clientele in the intellectual community at Yale University. In this thoughtful memoir, Kaoud details his journey and celebrates the creativity of the talented villagers whose imagination and industry created the beautiful carpets that he has bought, sold, and cared for in a career spanning more than sixty years.