helmarblog
H813-4 Boston Garter-Helmar
Boston Garter Joe Wood Rug Update II
A great deal of planning goes into a hand-knotted rug before it even gets on the loom. First, of course, the basic design is agreed upon and colors that will be needed are selected. In our case the design will be based upon our Boston Garter Joe Wood art card. A true four-color is not possible with jacquard and so representational art, such as our Wood, is usually not attempted. With endless varieties of beautiful geometric designs readily available to the weavers that we will work with, there is usually little point in attempting to convey subjects as difficult as as subjective as the human face. However, this is Helmar and we always seem to be pushing the envelope.
Two issues are of immediate concern. In order to accomplish the intricate design that we’ve chosen it will be necessary for the weaver to make 300 hand-knots per inch when I can barely tie my shoe once. Secondly, a high quality hand-knotted rug will sometimes include up to a dozen different colors of yarn. Our piece, however, will have up to 25. The more colors that need to be integrated the more difficult the weaving. There’s no question; we’ll need an experienced artisan at the loom.
I’ll leave you with just one photo today–our yarn has already been dyed. Here is what it looks like:
Follow our new project with me!
A few months ago I was reading up on the stunning medieval tapestries at the NY Met. How beautiful they are! The amount of clever designing, experimenting and yes, tedious work required is mind numbing. And, as usual, I found myself wondering about this process and how it could relate to baseball. There is not a deep textile tradition in sports art and little in the way of large scale imagery.
To make a long story short, I began to research the process in some depth. It was soon apparent that old style jacquard weaving is an art that has almost disappeared. These days if you want a rug or wall hanging it is nearly always made utilizing digital printing on artificial material. Some of it looks…okay. But the real thing? You’ll have to dig deep for a traditional supplier.
After a great deal of time I have found a maker of hand-knotted carpets and we have already started on our first collaboration. For the design I’ve selected one of my favorite Helmar art cards from the Boston Garter series, Joe Wood. Here is the image:
It takes a few months of hard work to make one of these. In my next post I’ll talk more about the process.
Charles Mandel
H813-4 Boston Garter-Helmar First Card: Ty Cobb
Our first Boston Garter prototype cards are finished and I’m quite pleased. The cards are huge at 8.5″ x 4.25″, which was the size of the original 1912 series. I’m planning of having 42 cards in the set but haven’t finished selecting the players. Paintings are already completed for a Wagner, a Mathewson, a Walter Johnson plus a few more.
The Cobb prototype was really fun to make; the huge size is a nice change of pace. The only problem is that I can’t decide which color sweater that I like best. What do you think? This week I will auction a red sweater version. Click to visit our auctions in another window here.
