The Carpetology Blog: Inspiring Carpet Styles from Fabrica

Friday, January 30, 2009

Inspiring Carpet Styles from Fabrica

Back in December, if you remember from A Foot's Perspective - Episode 18: Fabrica's Silk Weave, I got to meet and present with Robbie Schuette who talked to me about several other Fabrica carpet styles that I consider inspiring beyond description.

More specifically, styles like Shandur, Nibbana, Abrash and Antigua - all made with Wear-Dated carpet fiber.

The photo above shows you three samples of Antigua set on top of two Silk Weave samples. Named after a beautiful island in the Caribbean, Antigua - a plush casual texture or frieze carpet style - has a casually elegant, highly textured "windswept" look. The "hand" of this carpet style is soft and buttery. According to Robbie, this comes from both the construction and that the carpet style is made with Wear-Dated DuraSoft carpet fiber.

Fabrica considers Antigua a "best-in-class" product that offers both beauty, performance, superior texture and warmth for today's interiors and an exceptional color palette. It feels delicious under hand, and even better underfoot, I'm sure!

Abrash, Shandur and Nibbana are a collection of products offering a clean, fresh, contemporary approach to floor coverings. Inspired by the rugged Himalayan mountains, these products all feature a beautiful and subtle striation which adds to their handcrafted appearance.

Shandur and Nibbana share a common color line of seventeen colors [see photo above on left]. I find them sophisticated, exotic and comfortable.

Shandur, pictured here on the left and below, is a loop style construction.

Nibbana, the carpet style below Shandur, is considered a loop pattern in that the look is created from a combination of loop and texture construction. Robbie also referred to it as "tip sheared."

She explained to me that the tip shearing randomly shears or cuts the tips of the carpet yarns. This adds another dimension to the carpet style by providing cut pile and softness of hand with pile flow and silkiness. The precision shearing gives contrasting textures of cut pile and loop pile mixed with pattern.

Nibbana was introduced right after Shandur was launched. Both products have a striated effect with subtle shading of the colorations. These are deliciously inspiring carpet styles!

The third carpet style in this family is Abrash. It shares the Nibbana/Shandur color line, but with an additional selection of colors - offering you 25 colors to choose from.

Abrash represents a plush texture carpet style: it's a thick, dense cut cut pile textured construction. It feels luxurious and opulent to the touch.

What amazes me when I experience these Fabrica carpet styles is not only how wonderful they feel to the touch, but also how visually unusual and exciting they are. Antigua's soft buttery casual texture/frieze look and Shandur's, Nibbana's and Abrash's striated effect with subtle shading of colors really makes for inspiring carpet styles - that, as Robbie reminds me, given the common palette+, you have the option to use the same color in a variety of textures in your home - sure to create a beautifully fashionable, sophisticated and delicious statement!