Persian Rugs Will Return to US Markets
Alex Helmi, surrounded by Persian carpets stacked waist-high at his store in the so-called Persian Square section of Los Angeles, has been blocked from importing rugs from Iran since the United States imposed sanctions in 2010.
Helmi has about 3,000 of the carpets at his store Damoka, an inventory he has maintained to some extent by buying rugs second-hand from people in the United States.
"Nobody in the world can make hand-made carpets better than Persians. They have been doing it for thousands of years," said Helmi, 59, who has been in the carpet business for nearly 40 years.
For Arash Yaraghi, dealing in Iranian carpets has been a family business for generations.
But the CEO of Safavieh, a seller of rugs and furniture with a dozen retail centers in New York City and surrounding areas, has been forced to nearly eliminate Persian rugs from his inventory. When he and a brother founded the business in 1978, that was all they sold.
When he is able to resume imports of Persian carpets from Iran, he expects his firm Safavieh will have the opportunity to find products suited to modern American tastes.
"I'm excited about the variety of quality and the character of carpets that will come out of there that we've haven't seen for a long time," Yaraghi said.
http://www.reuters.com/article/2015/07/15/us-iran-nuclear-rugs-idUSKCN0PP18B20150715
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