HKDI Gallery

Re Rag Rug started as an experimental design project by Katarina Brieditis and Katarina Evans in 2012. A rug is the ultimate textile furniture. Through times it has been on our floors, beds, walls and tables. All over the world rugs protect from cold floors and draft, they have a major impact on the acoustics of a room. They gather groups of furniture in a space, create a room in the room and serve as an aesthetic element to a room. Rugs should withstand to be stood, walked and crawled upon and they are important bearers of culture for many people.

During a 12 months’ creative process, 12 unique rugs have been developed in 12 different textile techniques by the two designers. The material is waste and excess from the textile industry and old clothes – fabric that would otherwise be discarded.

By using different types of rags in combination with a variety of sewing, platting, crocheting, knitting, macramé, rolling, cutting, appliqué, embroidery, structure and relief effects, three dimensionality, colour and dyeing techniques and experimenting with scales, the duo have created twelve new qualities and expressions of rugs.

Re Rag Rug is an example for sustainable design that the value of a seemingly worthless material can be added.

The project has won several international awards, for example: Textile of the year for ELLE Decoration Design award, Design of the year from Trendgruppen, Craft of the year from Trendgruppen as well as the Culture Price of the Year, Rotary Stockholm-Skanstull.

Visit Studio Brieditis & Evans and see their complete project at www.reragrug.blogspot.se.

Copyright 2014 Hong Kong Design Institute and Hong Kong Institute of Vocational Educatiion (Lee Wai Lee)

Katarina Brieditis

As a graduate from University College of Arts, Crafts and Design, Katarina Brieditis works as a freelancer and makes designs for textiles, table wares and products for companies such as Linum, IKEA, Y’s for Living and Rörstrand. 

She also teaches at several design schools including the University College of Arts, Crafts and Design in Stockholm (Konstfack), the School of Design and Craft at Steneby (HDK), the Foundation Steneby School, Nyckelvikskolan and the Swedish School of Textiles in Borås.

Katarina Evans
Studied Textile History in the University of Uppsala, Katarina Evans has a strong background working with unique pieces of textile art and conservation of antique textiles. She is also renowned for her embroidery skill and has instructed custom-made classes, lectures and workshops for craft organisations and educational associations. For the past ten years, she has been working as a product developer of home textiles for Linum Company.

Copyright 2014 Hong Kong Design Institute and Hong Kong Institute of Vocational Educatiion (Lee Wai Lee)

1. TAILOR
Material: Wool Front, Jute Backing
Colour: Black-Grey 
TAILOR has a pattern that is strong yet elegant, like an exclusive suit fabric. The stripes of felted, discarded woollen sweaters are stitched diagonally to a base fabric. The designers, Katarina Brieditis and Katarina Evans, have worked with shades and nuances to give lustre to the dull material. The rug is made in sections, lined separately and stitched together. By mirror facing the different diagonal stripes, the pattern can be varied in a number of ways. The sections could be produced as running meter, to be cut and joined into desired length and width.

2. KASURI 
Material: Cotton
Colour: Blue 
KASURI reminds people of the Japanese textile — Kasuri, which is ikat-dyed and done with woven technique. Braiding of rags into rugs is well known but the designers wanted to find a new expression for the technique. They discovered that the braids created different patterns if they are placed alongside with each other and thus they created a series of patterns by varying the colours and widths of the braids. This way of working with colours, composition and qualities can be developed into many new designs. The rug is made of discarded T-shirts.

3. PEPITA
Material: Wool Front, Jute Backing
Colour: Brown-Black 
PEPITA looks yummy. Like chocolate, nougat, butterscotch, sugar cubes and coffee with and without milk. The very long rug is toned in colours that diffuse the pattern and enhance the perspective of length. The technique where warp meets weft in the simplest of weaves is applied but the colour effect creates a hound’s tooth design. The material is felted woollen sweaters. The material is cut into stripes, stitched double to make it heavy but still soft. The edge of the rug reminds people of the basketry work.

4. ARCHIPELAGO
Material: Cotton Front, Jute Backing 
Colour: Multi-Blue 
ARCHIPELAGO resembles a map with greens lands, sand and deep sea but is built on a small embroidery with a hound’s tooth design. The technique applied is enlarged and extended cross-stitch embroidery. Many kilos of coloured T-shirts gave the designers a rich palette to ‘paint’ with and create unique shades and colour combinations. The result is a changeable surface with depth and slightly billowy and the designers want to make it flows further and grow twice of the size. 

5. MILKY WAY
Material: Wool Front, Jute Backing 
Colour: Blue 
MILKY WAY is the result of an integration between two textile traditions with two very different expressions. It is also the integration between dark and light, diamond and junk. The rug is made of discarded woollen sweaters constructed with layers. The designers wanted to work with the hexagonal shape but not in the traditional way used in patchwork quilts. The hexagon is also common in Japanese Shibori dying, thus the design is made by folding the hexagons into triangles before shibori-dying them in a dark blue shade, reminding people of the Japanese indigo. In the composition, the designers wanted to create sparkles and high-lights to add lustre to the material.

6. AQUARELLE
Material: Wool Front, Jute Backing 
Colour: Multi 
AQUARELLE is composed with colour blocks of parallel checks. Each block is a patchwork of irregular pieces of woollen sweaters in the same colour tone. The different tones create a texture where light meets shadow or wet meets dry. The rug is constructed by layers of woollen sweaters, and the base layer is reinforced by machine stitching. The decorative top layer is attached with a running stitch - the simplest stitches, and the designers have seen it as ‘Kantha’ on their travels to India, Pakistan and Bangladesh and as ‘Sashiko’ in Japan.

7. ROSENGÅNG
Material: Wool Front, Jute Backing 
Colour: Off-White 
ROSENGÅNG associates to a well-used, woven, traditional Swedish rag rug. It has stripes of decorative patterned borders (in Swedish: Rose path) and is made from thick felted woollen sweaters and thus forms a heavy structure. The feeling however is soft and the rug’s appearance is light. When the feet sink into the texture, it gives a feeling of walking on moss. The curves of its path creates a dynamic rhythm which allows audiences to flow along with, however, with the existence of the horizontal stripes, the curves of Rosengång still possesses a beauty of calmness.

8. OFF PIST 
Material: Cotton Front, Jute Backing 
Colour: White 
OFF PIST looks soft and pliable, like the snow on a landscape, but every bend offers tough resistance. As the designers wanted the rug looks as soft as a knit but still has the sturdiness of a rug, thus the motif of an enlarged knit composed by 'a knit of a knit of a knit' is applied. The rug is embroidered with an embroidery technique that looks like a knitted stitch, and the material is T-shirt rags which is a knitted fabric.

9. Re ORIENT
Material: Cotton 
Colour: Multi 
Re ORIENT is crocheted. A technique of nostalgia and textile memories, which depends on where and when a person grew up. In Sweden, crochet has been regarded as an ugly technique and with less value than other handicraft techniques. The designers wanted to find a new expression for this simple and genius technique. All the designers need is a crochet needle and the technique that offers freedom to create free and playful patterns. The material is discarded T-shirts and the designers chose a rich colour palette. The design is inspired by the Oriental rug as well as the Röllakan and the granny square. ‘Re Orient’ marries the highly valued Oriental rug with the underrated crochet.

10. SQUEEZE
Material: Cotton 
Colour: Black-White
SQUEEZE is knitted with a jersey yarn in a two-coloured double knit. It is one of the most elastic knits the designers know. It was hand-knitted in India, out of excess from the T-shirt industry. The quality is so elastic that it flows with weight, it becomes alive. Black dominates one side, while white the other. When the stripes in the knit expand, the white shines through and when contracted, the black becomes denser. To ‘sweep things under the rug’ is tempting as the optical effect enhances the shapes it covers. Is it a rug or not?

11. NOMAD 
Material: Wool 
Colour: Grey
NOMAD is natural, like a skin rug. The designers were donated a large box of woollen selvedges from Klippans Yllefabrik in Latvia and were struggling with combining the colours given - the challenge when working with waste materials - it is impossible to order preferred colours. Finally the designers spun the selvedge into a stronger yarn using a crochet needle on a drill. By combining the yarn with a flat fabric, they found an interesting structure. The fabric is cut by the yarn and at the same time, the yarn is woven into the fabric. The pattern is a free interpretation of goose-eye twill and herringbone.

12. CONFETTI
Material: Wool Front, Linen Backing 
Colour: Multi
CONFETTI could be the largest rug made of the tiniest pieces by the designers. The grey triangles cutting from the waste of their first rug, Tailor, inspired the designers to make a wall-to-wall carpet. Layers of woollen sweaters which are covered with triangles have been stitched by machine to reinforce each square to a sturdy and thick quality. The checks can be combined in many ways and the designers have added more colours to the squares as they went along. With the colour added, the design looks like stone and marble floors, colourful bunting or confetti, celebrating the end of their 12-month project for the 12 sets of rugs shown in this exhibition!

Copyright 2014 Hong Kong Design Institute and Hong Kong Institute of Vocational Educatiion (Lee Wai Lee)