Writing in the late 1940s, English oriental carpet professional A. Cecil Edwards identified the gentleman who dreamed up the first rugs destined to become known as American Sarouks or painted Sarouks. Mr. S. Tyriakian, of the New York firm of K.S Taushandjian, thought Americans might buy rose-field carpets with blue borders and detached floral motives. He submitted his own design to Arak weavers, a design that was not very Persian in character but was nonetheless attractive. 
Writes Edwards, "The design was successful beyond its creator’s fondest imaginings. The orders poured in to Sultanabad…Before long, 
Sultanabad was weaving little else…Unhappily, the story does not end there. The new style radiated outwards from Sultanabad and 
spread its baleful influence over the designers of Kashan, Meshed, Kerman and Hamadan. Tabriz alone escaped." Why does Edwards 
call the new style baleful? Largely because of its monotony and pervasiveness over many years, but also because of an additional twist. 
You see, the beautiful, naturally-dyed rose color used in Sarouks of the 20s and 30s could not stand up to the alkaline bath to which 
new rugs in Arak were subjected in the finishing process. The rose-color faded radically.But instead of changing the finishing process or changing the composition of the dyes to stand up to alkali, New York merchants "solved" the problem by arming their staffs with synthetic dyes and little paint brushes with which they painted back in the rose-color in 
the entire fields of thousands and thousands of rugs and carpets over a period of 20 years.

Seventy five years later, many of these Sarouks are still in use on American floors. Some look terrible. Their painted-on red has 
become mottled and uneven. Others, defying reasonable expectations, look wonderful! After being lightly regarded for perhaps forty years, they are now back in favor. The grace of age has given them added value in our eyes. A pretty 9 by 12 ft carpet, in by no means perfect condition, can easily fetch $8,500. During the past 15 years techniques have been developed for stripping the paint from old Sarouks. Sometimes the process results in the restoration of a rug’s original, glorious color. But not always. The results are inconsistent, and it is possible to ruin a Sarouk by stripping it. In any case, because the process is hard on rugs, only Sarouks in very good condition can be successfully stripped.

How do you identify an American Sarouk? They are woven with the asymmetrical knot, usually about 120 of them per square inch. They are double wefted and have a fairly stiff handle. At least 95% are in rose fields; a few are blue. They have designs of scattered floral sprays. If, in addition to these features, you find that the field-color of a carpet is light rose on the back and dark rose- or even burgundy- on the top, it’s an American Sarouk.