Rugs to riches

Despite communities across Europe and Asia all having a proud legacy of rug-making, it can sometimes be challengeing to tell their products apart. After all, these floor coverings serve a singular purpose: to be smooth, plush and comfortable underfoot. But this textile-weaving process differs significantly from country to country – and can tell us much about the cultures and communities behind it. Here are three firms that show why we should care more about what lies beneath our feet. — L

1.
THE HERITAGE MAKER
Yamagata Dantsu
Yamanobe, Japan

If you happen to be strolling through the lobby of Kabukiza – Tokyo’s most famous kabuki theatre – or the main lobby of the Rihga Royal Hotel in Osaka, a hulking landmark in the centre of the city, look down. Beneath you are some of the most dynamic, colour-saturated carpets that you can find anywhere in the world. The swirling patterns feature phoenixes and giant maple leaves in vibrant, autumnal hues. Inspired by nature and crafted with exceptional skill, these incredible carpets are the work of one small company in the north of Japan: Yamagata Dantsu, officially known as Oriental Carpet Mills, which has been in business since 1935.
Yamagata Dantsu’s factory in the rural town of Yamanobe is made up of a well-preserved cluster of pink wooden buildings from the late 1940s, which live on as though oblivious to the rollercoaster of Japan’s postwar economic period. When monocle visits, the mood is cheerful but hushed. A team of women, who make up 90 per cent of the workforce, concentrate on the detailed work that has earned them commissions to carpet Japanese government ministries, executive boardrooms, public buildings, hotels, embassies and palaces. When the Japanese cabinet meets today, ministers sit at a wooden table and rest their feet on a soft Yamagata Dantsu carpet.

It’s appropriate that the firm’s name references its own prefecture, as concern for (and pride in) its community has been built into the business from day one. In the 1930s the area was hit by cold weather, poor harvests and a gruelling recession. Junnosuke Watanabe, the company’s founder, was running a cotton-weaving business and decided to take action to help the flailing local economy. In 1935 he invited seven Beijing-based craftsmen specialising in Chinese dantsu, an East Asian rug-weaving tradition, to come to his obscure corner of Tohoku to pass on their skills. Some two years later, the first Yamagata Dantsu rug emerged – and the path for Yamanobe and its people was set. Today the business is run by Hiroaki Watanabe, grandson-in-law of the founder, and his sons Atsushi, Takashi and Naoshi.

Hiroaki’s sons are building on the legacy of a company that rose to fame off the back of two products. The first, hand-knotted dantsu, involves a technique that sees individuals painstakingly hand-tie individual threads of wool onto a cotton warp at a pace of about a few centimetres per day. The other, hand-tufted dantsu (also known as “Crafton”), has been produced by Yamagata Dantsu since 1965. This approach sees workers use a special tufting gun to insert wool threads into a stretched cotton cloth.

When monocle visits, two women are knotting slender woollen threads together to make hand-woven dantsu. “These carpets are very, very dense,” says Takashi. “They require about 10 times the number of threads that you would normally expect. Though the technique originated in China, it was adapted to suit the Japanese lifestyle. Hand-woven dantsu are perfect for walking on without shoes as they’re soft in texture but firm underfoot.” The carpets are given their distinctive three-dimensional look and texture during the next stage of the rug-making process, when they are carved by hand with small knives and scissors. It’s a high-pressure procedure in which one mistake can ruin an entire rug. As monocle passes through, workers are also cleaning a vintage rug, which eventually emerges as good as new.

The restoration of this rug hints at the longevity and ubiquity of the brand across Japan. As the country’s postwar economy grew, the workshop’s brilliantly colourful carpets were installed everywhere from the foreign ministry to the prime minister’s residence. Yamagata Dantsu made rugs, carpets and wall hangings for all the big names in mid-century Japanese design and architecture, including Togo Murano, Kenzo Tange, Isamu Kenmochi and Yoshiro Taniguchi. Late French designer Charlotte Perriand visited the workshop on her first trip to Japan in 1940 and made an original, hand-woven rug the following year. Both the Vatican and Japanese royals have been important patrons too. When architect Junzo Yoshimura designed the new Imperial Palace in Tokyo, he commissioned Yamagata Dantsu to make large quantities of plain and patterned hand-knotted carpets.

But it hasn’t always been smooth sailing for the company. During the period when Japan was under US occupation following the Second World War, materials were in short supply. But the firm discovered a way to weave the roots of the kudzu tree into thread and continued to make hand-woven carpets, some of which eventually graced the command room of General Douglas MacArthur’s headquarters in Tokyo’s Hibiya neighbourhood. Another 200 carpets were woven with wool taken from military uniforms and delivered to the Imperial Hotel in Tokyo. Those efforts paid off and the business was allocated a supply of imported wool. Exports boomed and the US market clamoured for “Fuji Imperial Rugs”, as the carpets were known overseas.

Despite these successes, there have been recent tremors: in 2011 the Tohoku earthquake nearly forced the company to close. “The economy was hard and when times are tough great products like ours become luxuries,” says Hiroaki. “The craftsmen were getting older too, so I was thinking about shutting down the business.” Thankfully, the owner persisted. The workshop is training young people again, many of them locals.

Hiroaki’s sons have brought their own enthusiasm to the brand and there is now a showroom in Tokyo. Though the company still receives big commissions – it was called on to create rugs for the new Kyoto State Guesthouse – construction budgets are not what they used to be. The business has since had to look beyond its traditional customer base to appeal to a more global audience. “We wanted to create something that would interest more people in the interior-design world,” says Takashi. As such, the firm has been collaborating with designers and artists on special-edition rugs. The business recently launched New Crafton, a line that focuses on smaller, supersoft rugs made from fine-count wool in contemporary neutrals selected by Tokyo fashion label Yaeca.

The refreshed approach has led to increased brand awareness among young Japanese creatives such as interior designer Teruhiro Yanagihara, who, in 2023, commissioned soft rugs for fashion label Mame Kurogouchi’s new shop dressing room in Aoyama. When the Rihga Royal Hotel lobby was refurbished in 2019, the workshop set about making the vast leaf-covered carpet that can be found there today. It’s a recreation of the same carpet that had been installed in the hotel decades before but with a design refresh by emerging Tokyo-based studio Torafu Architects. Yamagata Dantsu craftsmen also spent two and a half years making hand-embroidered carpets with a multi-coloured Phoenix pattern for architect Kengo Kuma’s Kabukiza theatre rebuild.

In January the firm launched the Yamagata Dantsu Archives collection, a series of rugs that were originally co-created by the company and other designers, and have long been out of production. These include four carpets devised by designer Isamu Kenmochi for the lobby of the Keio Plaza Hotel, which opened in Tokyo in 1971. These retro revivals are helping to bridge the gap between Yamagata Dantsu’s heritage and its embrace of modernity.

“I feel optimistic about the future”, says Hiroaki, surveying a room filled with memorabilia and photographs of the company’s history. These images document a success that stems not only from making unique carpets but also from a commitment to community, the preservation of traditional skills and constant innovation. Yamagata Dantsu continues to prove that by taking such an approach, creative firms can weather economic hardship, war and natural disasters – and still make beautiful products.
yamagatadantsu.co.jp

2.
the perfect match
Jaipur Rugs and Shyam Ahuja
Jaipur, India

On a sun-soaked rooftop on the outskirts of Jaipur, India, a young woman hums a folk tune as she sews the edges of a hand-knotted carpet. Around her, fellow artisans wash, stretch, and snip rugs in a multitude of shapes and colours. This frenzied activity seems apt for an employer whose star is on the rise. Jaipur Rugs has, since it was established by Nand Kishore Chaudhary in 1978, grown to become one of India’s largest handmade-carpet manufacturers. And it is now set for further expansion following the acquisition of fellow Indian rugmaker Shyam Ahuja.

“Initially, we questioned the decision,” says Yogesh Chaudhary, the second-generation director of Jaipur Rugs. “Did we need another brand? But when I considered the business potential and the amazing legacy of Shyam Ahuja, I realised that it was a great opportunity for us to bring the company back to its former glory.” 

Shyam Ahuja was founded in 1963, long before India’s economic liberalisation in the late 1970s. It was then that the business and its late, namesake founder placed India on the international artisanal-carpet map. Ahuja’s unique approach to colour and design saw him transform the dhurrie, a flat-woven floor covering from northern India, into a collectible item, which was eventually owned by people such as Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis, Anna Wintour and Gianni Versace.

While this latest move will see Shyam Ahuja rely on Jaipur Rugs’s industry expertise, the two companies will operate independently from each other. Jaipur Rugs will balance its more antique and traditional carpets with a contemporary look, working with emerging designers to create bold forms and unexpected patterns. Though Shyam Ahuja is still determining its new direction, it will lean on its archive to craft rugs to pay tribute to the brand’s storied heritage.

In recent years, Jaipur Rugs has worked with the likes of multidisciplinary artist Lorenzo Vitturi, Chanel-owned yarn-maker Vimar 1991 and architect Hiren Patel. “Creative people are central to our innovation,” says Chaudhary. “Some of Lorenzo’s work weighed up to 100kg and had threads coming out of it that were a metre long. It pushed the dimensions of what our artisans are capable of. Back when Shyam Ahuja started, however, its focus was on timelessness. I have been told that Ahuja used to make ads without putting his brand name on them. He believed that if the right people saw them, they would know. That’s how strong his design language was.”

Jaipur Rugs’ acquistion of Shyam Ahuja is a boon for the carpet-making industry in India. In a country that has become a manufacturing hub for international labels, it’s good to have makers that are based in the same communities as their workers. This community-minded approach plays into Jaipur Rugs’ longstanding brand outlook. Historically, Rajasthan carpet makers came from communities that were regarded lower down the caste hierarchy than that which Nand Kishore Chaudhary, Jaipur Rugs’ founder, came from. But he decided early on in his career that the business would go against caste norms and empower skilled artisans. “Back in the 1970s my own relatives would refuse to shake my hand or welcome me into their homes because I worked with these people,” says Chaudhary. “But I maintained that my artisans were human too. I decided to tell their stories to the people who wanted to buy the products that they made.”

As part of its business model, Jaipur Rugs’ philanthropic arm, the Jaipur Rugs Foundation, trains new recruits in carpet-making, helping hereditary artisans to improve their skills. It also provides financial support to those who want to set up looms in their own homes. Today almost 85 per cent of Jaipur Rugs’ workforce is made up of women, many of whom are financially independent – no mean feat in a society that is achingly patriarchal. “When I started Jaipur Rugs, I wanted to connect my passion to my business,” says Chaudhary. “I think that I have achieved that goal. And now with Shyam Ahuja on board, we will create history.” 
jaipurrugs.com; shyamahuja.com

3.
the changemaker
Kasthall
Kinna, Sweden

Sweden’s Kasthall has been crafting rugs of exceptional quality and design since 1889. The firm’s factory in Kinna – an hour’s drive southeast of Gothenburg – is a well-established hub of textile innovation. This year the company will celebrate its 136th anniversary with a new chapter. Mirkku Kullberg, an industry veteran who runs multidisciplinary design consultancy Glasshouse Helsinki, has stepped in as ceo, bringing a wealth of experience from previous leadership roles at Finland’s Artek, Switzerland’s Vitra and Italy’s Poltrona Frau.

Kullberg’s appointment signals a renewed focus on international expansion for Kasthall, at a time when the global rug market is experiencing a renaissance. Following its 2023 acquisition by Network of Design – a Nordic furniture group that includes String Furniture and Grythyttan Stålmöbler, and on whose board Kullberg also serves – the company is looking to its newly minted ceo to tap in to its potential. Here, Kullberg tells monocle that this will involve material innovation and an evolution of the brand’s identity.

You come from a multi-disciplinary design background. Why take a role at a company that specialises in one product?
I really like brands that have an archive and design legacy. But I thought that Kasthall’s legacy was becoming a burden: it didn’t know how to interpret its heritage for new generations. I’m not great at creating organic business growth. I’m better at shaking things up and bringing people along – and that’s what I want to do at Kasthall.

What does ‘shaking things up’ look like at Kasthall?
Kasthall didn’t know how to position itself. It is a luxury product. But we also need to redefine what luxury means for Kasthall. We talk about this in a way that invokes a sense of beauty and natural, high-quality materials, which I think are the biggest luxuries in the world. In the context of our rugs, this means that we have to be more innovative in terms of bringing in new materials. Though we’re already doing amazing work with wool, we need to be exploring the potential of different types of textiles. Our factory has the capacity to work on everything from the spinning to dyeing of yarns. Sharing this knowledge can help us to attract international designers from across the globe because creative people want to be close to manufacturing; they want to work with those who are making things.

So keeping control of your production is key to ensuring the quality of your product while also attracting design talent?
Logistics and supply chains have become incredibly important. During the coronavirus pandemic, this was the most vulnerable part of many industries. With the current geopolitical climate, I think that this will remain the case. There’s also something to be said about having your own specialists. Some people have worked in the factory for 25 to 30 years; one of them even has a Kasthall logo tattooed on his hand. These people understand how to treat the materials and machines, and combine technology with classic techniques in a contemporary way.

What does innovation mean for rug-making today?
Innovation is always related to material technology. But the way that we work with rugs in an interior-design setting is changing too. The industry has been focused on chairs for so long, which is super boring. But I believe that this hyperfixation is finally coming to an end and people are starting to look at the floor space again. Rooms need several framing elements. We need to think about bringing textiles back into our environments. Rugs do both of these things.
kasthall.com