Blogs

Recently rug makers have been looking for ways to offer less expensive options. This month we thought we would swim upstream and show you some more expensive selections.

Important Costs Considerations

Number one:  silk. If the rug contains silk, it's going to be more expensive than a rug that doesn't contain silk. Silk is a natural fiber, really tough, and if cared for, lasts a really long time.

The word "fresh" is hard to describe, but we know it when we see it.

Take the shot of the entrance to Addison/Dicus and Bailey here. We just painted the building. It looks fresh.

Freshening our building has been going on for at least a century.

Wood flooring manufacturers are responding to the growing demand for patterned floors. There are now plenty of offerings of parquet and other styles like herringbone. Before manufactured floors, laying out patterns required finish carpenters and was extremely expensive. Now not so much.

Below are some examples of installed floors that demonstrate the quality and design options that patterned flooring offer.

With more pets than children living in American households in the 21st century, it's only natural that the Floor Covering business will respond to the needs of pet owners.

The New York Rug Show is a premier, forward-looking gathering and I generally go every year.

Several trends were important. First, the top-of-the-line producers are working hard to make less expensive rugs while maintaining premium quality.

Every design project has a budget and every one has a space to enhance.

Some spaces are allotted more money. Some have to get by.

Many jobs have a room that needs a nice design touch, but has little budget. For these floors many designers have relied on fabricated carpets to define the space and balance the colors in the room. A nice neutral cut to fit the room and nicely bound or basted has turned many low-budget rooms into great spaces.

Here was the problem. The designer and her client picked out a sisal/wool carpet. The mill delivered it on a 13' 2" roll.

But the coverage area required a carpet 17' 10" x 19' 11". The mill "declined" to seam two pieces together. In fact, the mill rep said the product was not meant to be seamed.

A pattern on the carpet complicated the task even more. If two pieces could be seamed together, the pattern would have to match exactly or the whole project would fail.

Bob Ford has the attitude that if something can be done with carpet, he can do it and do it well.

Several years ago Beni Ourain rugs were quite popular in the U.S. These were made by nomadic tribes in the Atlas Mountains spanning Morocco and Algeria. Raw white wool patterned with black or gray stripes or swatches with a long nap made them easily recognizable. We featured a small piece about Beni Ourains here.

We get a lot of questions about the best way to place a rug. 

Here are some suggestions with a few principles that you might find helpful.

Defining an Area

Rugs can corral a seating area in the middle of a large space and make gathering there more intimate.

Custom rugs can give a space a unique identity.

Tampa designer Mandy Vallowe showed Bob Ford a picture of a rug in a magazine. She thought the rug would work nicely in a condominium she's working on for a client on Harbor Island.

It's like a jigsaw puzzle, only the pieces are improvised straight-sided shapes. Bob developed a sketch for the project.