The archnemeses of war rugs Rug collector, dealer, and owner of WarRug.com, Kevin Sudeith in his New York City home. War rugs are a traditional Afghan art — how’d a guy in Brooklyn end up with their copyright? Aaron Davies remembers being blown away by the colors. Instead of the muted tones and abstract motifs of traditional Persian carpets, the rug in front of him depicted a map of Afghanistan surrounded by guns and tanks, woven with fluorescent pink, green, and blue threads. Known as a “war rug,” the textile made by Afghan weavers had traveled all the way from Peshawar, Pakistan, to his home in the United Kingdom in a battered cardboard box. “I just thought they were amazingly interesting,” says Davies, “It’s just such a bizarre concept to put on a rug.” Peshawar, near Pakistan’s border with Afghanistan, is home to a large Afghan refugee community and is a center of the country’s rug trade. Davies had purchased the rug online from a seller going by Imran Khan, who later told Davies that his store had been removed from eBay and he was having trouble moving his rugs.