Company Background & Information

Pak Persian Rugs is an international award-winning retailer, wholesaler, and manufacturer of authentic, 100% handmade rugs from Iran, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Central Asia, and other parts of the world.

Pak Persian Rugs Australia opened in May 2005 in Brisbane. Pak Persian Rugs has its roots in Pak Persian Carpets, Pakistan. Pak Persian Carpets has its production facilities based in Lahore and contracted looms in various locations throughout Pakistan.

The history of Pak Persian Carpets goes back four generations, well before the partition of India and Pakistan. A young Kashmiri man, Ghulam Rasul Butt joined A. Tallery & Sons, a handmade carpet producer in the subcontinent with European management, as a partner. Ghulam Rasul's particular expertise lay in wool dyes, and as this is such a crucial process in the production of hand knotted rugs, he was an invaluable part of the company.

Ghulam Rasul worked with A. Tallery & Sons all his life. Eventually, his nephew, Abdul Latif Butt joined and learned the carpet business. After some time, Abdul Latif and his son, Abdul Rashid, formed their own carpet production company in Amritsar, and sold their carpets to A. Tallery & Sons and other large carpet production houses for export to Europe and other regions in Asia.

By the time of partition between Pakistan and India in 1947, Abdul Rashid Butt was in charge of the company and made the decision to immigrate to Lahore with his wife and 11 children. Amritsar was no longer safe, as violence erupted between the three major ethnic groups of Amritsar: the Sikhs, Muslims, and Hindus. Rashid Carpet Factory was thus begun in Lahore, and was among the first handmade carpet production companies to begin producing rugs again after the tumultuous partition of Pakistan and India.

Of Rashid's children, 8 were sons, and they all joined the family business. By the 1970s, the business had expanded to larger scale manufacturing and export to Europe. Pak Persian Carpets became the new name of the company, and over the years retail outlets were established in Karachi, Lahore, Islamabad, Dubai, San Francisco, and Singapore. Many children of the 8 brothers are adults today and have also joined the business, and new retail outlets are being established all over the world.

Pak Persian Rugs in Brisbane, opened in May 2005, is one such outlet and is run by Ben Rashid, grandson of Abdul Rashid.