Ever since first stepping into London's Victoria and Albert Museum, I have been asking myself the same question: how has American trailblazing glass artist Dale Chihuly managed to produce a sculpture of the scale of the institution's iconic Rotunda Chandelier? And while I am yet to find an answer to my dilemma, you'll be pleased to hear his creative genius has just graced the latest launch of The Rug Company. Purchasable via both the luxury brand's website and Chihuly's own online platform, the four rugs released under the Masterpieces II series channel the boldness understanding of color, form, and movement inherent in his larger-than-life glasswork into extraordinarily crafted pieces that will revive your home.
Platformed by over 200 museum collections across the world, including the Metropolitan Museum of Art and the Smithsonian American Art Museum, Chihuly is primarily known for "having revolutionized the studio glass movement and for his design exhibitions and large-scale architectural installations," Chihuly Studio's Design and Brand Manager Goretti Kaomora tells me. Still, starting from his college years, when he took weaving classes as an interior design student, "textiles have been just as integral to his creative journey, and Chihuly has always appreciated the talent and skill involved in creating objects that possess both beauty and functionality," she adds. That's certainly true of this collection, for which he has reinvented the best rugs with skillful artisanry and innovation.
Material: Tibetan Silk and Wool
Knot Count: 100 Knot
Technique: Cut Pile
Price: From $6,480 (or $1,012.50/month)
Informed by the artist's practice — which seamlessly incorporates glass, paint, charcoal, neon, ice, and Polyvitro — The Rug Company's second collaboration with Chihuly is imbued with the same transformative essence of his production: mesmerizing abstract motifs expand across the surface of these rugs, whose soothing color palette and fantastical bubbly, or sea waves-inspired, patterns make them appear almost in motion, iridescent. Sparked by curiosity, Chihuly's discovery of glassblowing came to him serendipitously when studying at the University of Washington in 1965. "One night in his basement, on an impulse to experiment, he melted bits of stained glass on a metal pipe and blew his first glass bubble," Kaomora explains. "That moment captured his imagination, and he never looked back."
But it was in Venice that, after being awarded a Fulbright Fellowship which led him to Murano in 1968, the Seattle-based creative disruptor perfected his glassmaking techniques. He was the first American glassblower to work at the storied Venini factory, and showcased some of his earliest masterpieces across the city's pastel pink buildings and canals. Today, in what feels like a full-circle moment, the traveled alleys and romantic palazzos of the northern Italian gem provide the backdrop to Chihuly's newest designs for The Rug Company — "a celebration of craftsmanship" stretching the limits of fabric, scale, and form.
Material: Tibetan Wool and Silk
Knot Count: 100 knot
Technique: Cut Pile
Price: From $4,800 (or $750.00/month)
*Available in round and runner options
Handwoven with artisanal excellence by craftspeople in Nepal, each of the artist's creations makes an inspired addition to your modern homes. Modeled after the incessant, spiraling movement of water, River transfers the repetitive rings of molten glass onto its refined, handknotted blend of Tibetan wool and silk, making Chihuly's work more tangible and collectible than ever. Available in two colorways — the deep petrol blues and cool grays-punctuated River, and the River Shell's brighter neutral grays alternative — it works especially well with the stripped back, essential feel of mid-century modern furniture, or as a soft(er) accent to brutalist interiors.
Echoing the fantastical exploration of materiality, tone, and scope of Chihuly's Macchia series, Oyster is perhaps the most playful element in this collection. Here, soft nuances of pink, ochre, and turquoise animate its Tibetan wool base in an evocative visual effect resembling the mosaic-like surface of coral travertine marble, or that of a precious jewel stone. The monochromatic Scallop brings the winding rhythm of Chihuly's see-through glass compositions to the forefront in its handknotted, zebra-like design, while the eye-catching Coho weaves 32 different shades into an otherworldly canvas constellated by floating shapes which feel just as translucent.
Material: Tibetan Wool
Knot Count: 100 knot
Technique: Cut Pile
Price: From $6,480 (or $1,012.50/month)
*Available in round and runner options
Making the Masterpieces II collection this season's most versatile rug launch yet, each of Chihuly's designs is completely re-adaptable in size, shape, pile height, and color, and can be made-to-measure to embrace the volumes of both residential and contract spaces. From a wall-to-wall tapestry to a stair runner or even a fully personalized model, anything seems possible when The Rug Company and the multidisciplinary artist come together.
Driven by a lifelong appreciation of nature and the design lessons learned through his devoted study of pioneering architect Frank Lloyd Wright's houses — "an object, for him, is never just an object, but a set of considerations about how the object interacts with the space it occupies," explains Kaomora — Chihuly's creations have a raw, timeless energy to them. In taking the allure of the natural elements and his inimitable aesthetic inside the home through these rugs, he has demonstrated how much the art and the interiors scenes can gain from their cross-pollination, and allowed his work to reach an entirely new audience.
The Rug Company's Masterpieces II collection is available to buy here.
