96-year-old hand-woven rug company closing in Oakwood

A 96-year-old Oakwood business is expected to shut down by the end of May, according to its owner.

Adam Razipour, who also owns five stores in Pittsburgh, purchased Mousaian Oriental Rugs at the start of 2018 from the Mousaian family, who owned it for decades. The store is expected to wrap up liquidation sales at the end of May, Razipour said.

When Razipour bought the business, he said it was mainly because of its legacy, not because of the numbers. But the person he and his wife hoped would manage the store got married and moved, and it was difficult to manage the store from Razipour’s home in Pittsburgh.

“It’s just sad,” Razipour said. “Some businesses come and go, but this one here, no one will every be able to bring it back.”

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Authentic hand-woven rugs, mainly Persian, rugs typically range from $199 to thousands of dollars at Mousaian Oriental Rugs. The selection is still wide at the store, even after a month of private sales for former customers.

Most rugs are already marked down 65 percent.

“A lot of rugs are going to be at wholesale or below wholesale, but there’s also some investment pieces,” he said.

Shoppers can pick from antique Serapi and Silk Qum among many others, ranging from small to oversized.

Mousaian Oriental Rugs on Far Hills Ave. in the Shops at Oakwood was first opened in 1922 by Armenian immigrant Simon Kirkjian, according to the company’s website. At that time it was on West First Street in downtown Dayton.

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It was passed down through generations, moving from downtown to the Oregon District to Brown Street before making it to its current location in Oakwood, according to the website.

Many generations of Mousaians operated the store before selling it to Razipour in 2018. Kirkjian’s nephew from Turkey, Joseph Mousaian, and his wife Helen took over the business. They then passed the business on to daughter Susanne Mousaian Weaver and her husband Paul, who was retired from the U.S. Air Force.

The couple’s daughter-in-law Jennifer Weaver also helped run the business before its sale, according to the company’s website.

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