HAPPY RUG

The story behind the handwoven wool rug that is dyed naturally.

Connie Bingham says: The wool came from one of my buying flings while I visiting a Connecticut woolen mill outlet. There I found a bargain I couldn’t pass up. Cones and cones of an off-white rug wool. I bought as many as I could fit in my bags and brought it home to adorn the shelves in my craft room. After many years of dust collecting, I decided to put it into skeins and threw it in some pots of natural dyes. I didn’t see that any of the colors had any potential and was disappointed with the outcome. It then became the color accents in my basket collection where it grew dust bunnies for a few more years. One day I bagged it all up and deposited it on my sister Sherry, the rug weavers door step. Lo and behold! A few months later she gifted me with this beautiful handwoven Happy Rug. The Natural dyes used were:

• Dark purple lines - logwood
• Dark brown - Dock seed
• Dark Tan - Onion skins
• Natural color of yarn
• Lt. peach - Amanita Muscaria mushroom caps
  (highly poisonous, use extreme caution if you try them)
• Greenish-tan - Field Bind weed
• Natural color of yarn
• Dark Tan - onion skins with iron
• Lt. peach - Amanita Muscaria mushroom caps
  (highly poisonous, use extreme caution if you try them)
• Flesh color - Black Poppy petals
• Washed out yellow - pineapple weed
• Dk. Orange /Peach - Dahlia flowers

 

Sherry Rogers says: The rug is threaded as a 3-shaft Krokbragd, sleyed at 5 epi in a 10-dent reed. The warp is 10/5 wet spun linen and the weft was the miscellaneous naturally dyed wools that Connie provided. I steamed the rug while fastened to a piece of plywood to finish it after weaving. The fringe is the simplest variation of the Scandinavian "walking fingers" braid in which one side is rounded and the other side flat.

Click to see full size

Thanks Connie and Sherry for sharing your project on the Alaskan Fiber Arts web site!