THE ART OF HANDKNOTTING A RUG
A loom all ready for our staff to try handknotting themselves.
Art Day - when our whole team takes time away from regular work to indulge in pure creation on a particular theme - is at the heart of the design culture of Creative Matters. These sessions have included drawing to the gentle tones of a pianist; glass making; the beach; marbling technique; and many more. Imagine everyone’s delight this month when Senior Designer Sandra Ciganic-McKinney announced that she had booked four Tibetan rug weavers complete with mini-looms to join us for our next Art Day.
Most of our handknotted rugs are made in Nepal, the country next to Tibet. Nepal uses a Tibetan technique of handknotting that was taught to the Nepalis by the Tibetan refugees who started the Tibetan carpet industry in Nepal. While some Creative Matters designers have travelled to Nepal (and India) and watched handknotting in progress, the majority have not, so this visit from the Tibetan weavers was an amazing opportunity for the rest of us to get up close and personal with the technique. The more we all understand it, the more we can appreciate its possibilities when we’re creating designs for handknotted rugs.
The Creative Matters team with our guest artists. From left: Tsamchoe la, Phunstok la, Lhakyi la, Penpa la, Tenzin Chime (Administrative Director) and Rinchen Dolma (Artistic Director).
Sandra met the Tibetan weavers at Made in Exile, a community arts-based initiative, created by and for Tibetans in the Parkdale neighbourhood of Toronto. Through different programs, the organization creates opportunities for Tibetan-Canadian youth to explore their identity and their stories of living in exile. Their textile program is facilitated by local elders who explore traditional Tibetan carpet weaving as a means to connect with their history, community and artistry.
Lhakyi la sets up the warp (vertical) threads while Sandra looks on.
“The weavers arrived in the morning with their looms and dressed them with the warp yarns so they would be ready for the afternoon workshops,” said Sandra. “Each of the four looms was managed by an elder we were asked to call by the honourific title of “Amala”. Two Creative Matters staff went to each loom and our Amalas showed us how to do a knot along the rod.”
The traditional Tibetan knotting technique is the loop knot that is knotted around a metal rod.
We slowly made our way across the rod to the end of the row. Then the professionals would take over to do the transitions between the rows and cut the yarns across the rod, which was actually quite tricky to do. This creates the cut pile.
A weaver helping a Creative Matters staff member to make a loop knot.
“As we became comfortable, the Amalas taught us to do the row transitions and cutting the yarns. One worry with cutting the yarn was that the knife could potentially go into the warp yarns and cut through them. That would not be fixable. Fortunately, though some of us were close, we did not cut through any warp yarns,” said Sandra.
Logistics Manager Julie Baldwin handknots a striped design.
Made in Exile allowed us to keep the looms for the following week so we continued to weave when we had free time. “It was a special experience to work with these Tibetan weavers. And for me, it was also useful to understand how time-consuming the handknotting process is when we work with our mills in Nepal,” said Sandra.