Is it silk or viscose? Three tests you can do at home

1. The light test

Stand at one end of the rug, then walk to the other end and look again. Real silk reflects light directionally: the colors shift, darken or brighten depending on the angle, and the rug looks like a different rug from each end. Viscose has a uniform, glassy shine that looks the same from every angle. Not conclusive, but a strong hint.

2. The touch test

Silk is cool, dry and slightly crisp; viscose is softer, slicker and warmer to the hand, and a viscose rug that has ever been wet has stiff patches. Rub the pile against the grain: silk springs back; viscose stays flattened longer.

3. The burn test

The one that settles it. Pull a single fiber from the back or the fringe (not the face), hold it in tweezers, and touch a flame to it. Silk (and wool) smells like burning hair, burns slowly, self‑extinguishes and leaves a brittle black bead that crushes to powder. Viscose smells like burning paper, burns fast, and leaves a soft grey ash. Synthetics melt into a hard bead and smell of plastic. Do it over a sink.

Silk with viscose highlights

Many designer rugs from Nepal and India use bamboo viscose for the shiny highlights in a wool field. Test a highlight fiber, not a field fiber; the highlights are what set the cleaning method.

Why it matters

Silk is hand‑washed flat in cool water and dried cool; it survives water beautifully if it is never heated or agitated. Viscose is never immersed at all; it gets a low‑moisture clean and fast drying. Get them the wrong way round and the rug is damaged. At the Farmingdale plant every shiny rug is burn‑tested at inspection before a method is chosen. Read more on what goes wrong with viscose.