By Carol Sebert, Principal
Even though our design hub
is based at our head office in Toronto, an equally important part of our work
takes place in the countries where our carpets are physically produced. We regularly
visit India, Nepal, Thailand and now China to liaise with the skilled artisans
who bring our creations to life.
In March, I was back at
the “temporary field offices” in India and Nepal. After 25 years of touring
these beautiful but challenging countries, you might think I’d have reached a
been-there-seen-that attitude. Actually, the reverse is true – every trip is
still full of new discoveries. Having
toured so many production facilities, talked with so many local artisans and
developed an ease with the cultural differences, I now experience it all on a
much deeper and more detailed level.
Of course, with every trip,
I’m looking for new inspiration: something that will really fit for a
particular client; something that will take a new carpet trend just one step
further; something that will honour fair trade practices even more …
Two important discoveries this year concerned
knots. First I came across a mill
which can achieve a perfect low tight
loop pile. This has always been the domain of the Thai mills, so
finding a similar quality in India means we can offer it to our clients at a better price point.
Then – oh joy! – another
facility with a particularly extensive (over 100)
collection of hand looms and remarkable expertise to go with them, including
the Persian knot. Persian
rugs aren’t our specialty at Creative Matters, but we see an opportunity here
to offer our clients the remarkable quality of this knot in non-Persian
designs. FYI, a 9 x 12 (2.75 m x 3.75 m) carpet takes six months of knotting.
The most exciting discovery
of the trip was the potential of vegetable
dying. I had previously discounted it
because I didn't know of a master dyer who could get pretty well any colour
under the rainbow but now I do! It's pretty special - talk about eco friendly -
and we are thrilled to bring this opportunity to our clients in 2015. The photo
shows an example of the range of colours that are produced (by talented hands) with
the skin of pomegranates.
Traditionally the fringe of the rug is left at the
colour of the neutral wool used to assemble the warp and weft, so it was
interesting to visit with artisans who are perfecting the art of pre-dyeing the warp and the weft
to create a variety of blending or contrasting effects.
The art of weaving goes back centuries in these
countries and the range and ingenuity
of the equipment never ceases to amaze me. Here the weaver is using his
foot to work the warp threads – like a pipe organ.
Abrash is a
naturally occurring dye variation that creates subtle colour change - or a
stronger contrast - within a rug. At Creative Matters we often find that such
natural irregularities can add to the charm and authenticity of a hand woven
carpet. In this photo, a mill owner was showing me his control of gradations
with abrash – it’s useful for our staff to know we have a partner who can
control the contrast so skillfully.
No CMI carpet gets to the
loom before our designers have carefully examined multiple carpet squares. They
arrive almost daily in our Toronto office in sterile-but-reliable Fedex packs,
so what a pleasurable change it is to check samples in pure sunshine, under the
proud and watchful eyes of the mill owners amid the smells and bustle of daily
Indian life.
I work with colour every day
but vibrance of colours in Indian street life never fails to astound me.
Finally, what a joy it is to
discover a precious moment like this. It perfectly captures my love of textiles
and every little labour-intensive stage of producing hand-woven carpets.
