Robert Pinner

Metallurgist and carpet scholar who founded the International Conference on Oriental Carpets and created Hali magazine

Robert Hans Pinner was born in Hamburg in 1925, the second son of Dr Walter Pinner and his wife Elizabeth. As the persecution of Jews increased, the family left Germany in 1936 to settle in Birmingham, where Robert attended King Edward’s High School for Boys.

During the war the school was evacuated to Repton, Derbyshire, where he was billeted on a farm and also worked as a land boy. Afterwards he took a general science degree at University College, Aberystwyth, but his early career gave little hint of the scientific eminence to follow. He was dismissed by one firm because he was never able to produce the same results twice on repeating analyses.

However, he was drawn to the specialised area of metals finishing, setting up his own company and co-authoring a book, Surface Treatment and Finishing of Aluminium and its Alloys, published in 1956, which remained in print for decades. He also published a periodical, Metals Finishing Abstracts, which he continued to compile long after selling his company to concentrate on carpets.

This interest was born of the practical need to cover a newly installed parquet floor. Encouraged by Jean Lefèvre, who ran a carpet auction business in Knightsbridge, the Pinners began to study Turkoman and other rugs. Within a very short time a large and varied collection from many tribes was growing.

During the early 1970s Pinner and his wife travelled together, to museums, collectors’ conferences and markets throughout Europe, Russia and Central Asia. One such meeting led to the first International Conference on Oriental Carpets, held in 1976 alongside the World of Islam Festival in London. The ICOC continues to meet every four years or so in cities around the world. On retiring as chairman in 1999, Pinner was appointed chairman emeritus and chair of the executive committee.

The next natural progression was to preserve conference papers, and so the magazine Hali — Turkish for carpet — was founded in 1978. It is a beautiful publication, and was almost abandoned before the first issue because of the expense. The magazine was a worldwide success, but it needed more than its 4,500 subscribers; in 1986 it was sold to Centaur Communications, although Pinner continued to act as a consultant editor. A further spin-off has been the Hali textile fairs each summer at Olympia. For still more scholarly papers, Pinner launched the series Oriental Carpet and Textile Studies, which continued for many years. The list of his publications — books, catalogues, papers, articles and reviews — is formidable.

Despite all this, he also managed to find time to enjoy music, particularly Beethoven’s late quartets; chess — again a passion that he shared with his wife — and the pleasures of the table. The hospitality and stimulating company at his home in Twickenham will be greatly missed by fellow carpet enthusiasts from around the world.

His wife died in 1982.

Robert Pinner, metallurgist and carpet expert, was born on September 11, 1925. He died on November 20, 2004, aged 79.

We regret to announce the sad passing of HALI's co-founder Robert Pinner, a dear friend and respected colleague, who died peacefully at home in Twickenham on Saturday November 20th after a year-long battle with severe heart disease.

Firm arrangements are yet to be made, but it is likely that a small private funeral will be followed by a memorial service at a later date. We will keep Robert's many friends informed of memorial arrangements through this website.