A great carpet from the Alexander or Kirchheim collections (Alexander, 1993; Kirchheim, Franses et al., 1993) transcends its materials and connects with the viewer in much the same way as would another living being. But what is it that gives "life" to a carpet? Lovers of old carpets instinctively know what is beautiful, yet many points in that assessment are only subconscious. The following discussion tries to raise such factors to a conscious level. By codifying the principles underlying the design of carpets, it may eventually be possible to compute the "life" of a carpet as a mathematical coefficient from the design.