Category: Rugs

Throughout these chapters on domestic rug-making, I have given the old and familiar recipes for the colors used in dyeing the materials for the rugs since there seems to be a certain poetic justice in the association of these old-time methods. The recipes are for dyestuffs known as natural dyes. Some of them, however, like […]

The braided rug is one of the most serviceable and effective of the needle rugs. It is so simple in technique that any careful needlewoman can make it. And consequently it is the one most frequently seen in the farmhouses in New England and Middle States. Sometimes indeed a complete floor covering is formed by […]

The scalloped doormat or “tongue” rug gets its name from the shape of the piece of cloth from which it is built up. It is our second example of a needle-made rug and logically follows the braided rug. It is made with the sewing needle. Though not as frequently seen as some of our other […]

The knitted rug is another rug which has reached the satisfactory standard of modern craftsmanship and is also a striking example of how successfully a rug based on a humble craft can be made if well-planned. Surely to paraphrase a familiar quotation, “The plan’s the thing.” The craft of knitting cannot be said to possess […]

However humble may be the kindred crafts of knitting and crocheting, much interest may be developed in them through a thoughtful consideration of their technical possibilities. Any one, you would say, can crochet even if she cannot knit. So much the better then, for more craft workers will find that even such a simple art […]

We may safely say that the hooked rug or the pulled rug, as it is sometimes called, is the most important of the handmade rugs. It has been more successfully developed under new conditions of craftsmanship than any other of- the old-fashioned rugs. In nearly all the show rooms of the Arts and Crafts Societies […]

In the plan for the hooked rug in cotton the design is of the quaint old-fashioned kind, suggestive of the Colonial times and suitable for a bedroom furnished in that style. It represents a basket of gayly colored garden flowers. The border is blue and surrounds the oval panel reaching to the edges of the […]

The design for the hooked rug in wool is called the ” Tea Chest Pattern ” because it was suggested by the design on an old Chinese tea chest. The wide-awake designer is always on the lookout for some interesting motif, and is ready for a suggestion from any quarter. The tea chest pattern is […]

The needle-woven rug is one of the most interesting examples of craft work, be-cause it stands between the rugs of the needle and the loom. The rugs of the needle are the hooked, the knitted, crocheted and braided rugs, made with one single tool. It bridges the gap between these strictly hand-made rugs and the […]

This primitive loom or frame is exactly like the frame used in making the hooked rug; the proportions only are different. It is a rectangular frame made of four wooden bars which are one by two inches in thickness. There are two pieces fifty-three inches long which form the sides and two pieces thirty-two inches […]