Four flowers do most of the work in Iznik design: the tulip, the carnation, the hyacinth and the rose. They stand on long stems, drawn in profile, among curving leaves, and they have been copied on tiles, textiles and ceramics for centuries. Iznik is a town in northwestern Anatolia, historically Nicaea, and its pottery reached its height in the sixteenth century under the Ottoman court.
What Iznik pottery is
Iznik ware is made from a quartz-rich body (often called fritware) covered with a white slip, painted under a clear glaze. The painters worked from designs prepared by the court's design studio, which is why Iznik looks so consistent: the same vocabulary appears on plates, mosque tiles and silk.
The palette grew over time. Cobalt blue and turquoise came first. In the middle of the sixteenth century a thick, raised tomato red appeared, along with a sage green. You can see large tile panels in Istanbul at the Rüstem Pasha Mosque, in Topkapı Palace, and in the Blue Mosque (the Sultan Ahmed Mosque, built in the early seventeenth century).
The vocabulary
| Element | How it is drawn |
|---|---|
| Tulip | A slender, pointed bloom on a straight stem, usually three visible petals |
| Carnation | A fringed, serrated edge on a flower seen in profile |
| Hyacinth | A cluster of small bell flowers on a spike |
| Rose | A rounded bloom, often shown in profile with sepals |
| Saz leaf | A long, curved, serrated blade, sometimes with a spiral at the tip |
| Hatayi | A lotus- or palmette-like blossom, drawn in profile or from above |
| Rumi | Split-leaf, curling arabesque forms |
Two court styles are worth knowing. The saz style, associated with the court painter Şahkulu, uses long serrated leaves and fantastical blossoms. The "four flowers" style, associated with the court artist Kara Memi, is more naturalistic and favors the tulip, carnation, hyacinth and rose.
The tulip also has a special place in Ottoman culture. The period from 1718 to 1730, under Sultan Ahmed III, is known as the Tulip Era.
Beyond tiles: Ottoman textiles
The same flowers appear in Ottoman silk brocades and velvets, and on embroidery. A well-known textile motif is the çintamani, three balls above wavy lines, found on silk kaftans. When you design in this vocabulary, think of tiles and textiles as one system.
A palette
- Cobalt #1E3E8A
- Turquoise #2BA6A0
- Tomato red #D0402B
- Sage green #5C8A5A
- Outline black #1A1A1A
- Ground white #F5F1E6
Use red sparingly. In Iznik it appears as a few accents, not the main field.
Designing a floral tile in the Iznik manner
- 1Start with the stem. Draw three or four long, slightly curved stems that rise from the bottom of the tile.
- 2Place the flowers. Put a tulip on one stem, a carnation on the next and a hyacinth beside them. Vary their heights.
- 3Add the saz leaves. Sweep one long serrated leaf diagonally across the gaps, with a second smaller one curling the other way.
- 4Mirror it. Reflect the composition left to right for a symmetrical tile, as Iznik panels do. If you want a seamless textile, offset the mirrored tiles in a half-drop; see our mirror repeat tutorial.
- 5Outline and fill. Fill the shapes in cobalt and turquoise and add red details last. Keep the line crisp and confident.
- 6Check the tile edge. Stems should cross the border at the same point on opposite sides.
Iznik shares ancestors with Persian floral design, covered in our Persian pattern design guide, and with the Mughal floral tradition in the Mughal pattern design guide. For ceramic pattern history more broadly, see ceramics and pottery pattern design.
The Turkish patterns, Islamic tile patterns and floral patterns categories provide starting points. With Describe It in Pattern Weaver you can write your own prompt, such as "Ottoman-style tulips and carnations with saz leaves in cobalt, turquoise and red on white", then check the seamless tile.
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