rag rug round three

I made one. I made a rag rug

I was starting to feel like Goldilocks. This base material was too tough, this one was too soft. This hook was too thick, this one was too fiddly. Until finally I worked out the materials and method which were just right.

Nevertheless, reading the how-to books, you’d really think there was only one way: hessian and a rag rug hook (great, if that’s what works for you). It’s funny that of all the ten or so how-to books I consulted, practically every one devoted just one very short paragraph each to the backing and the hook. And yet, as with skinning cats, there are may different ways a rag rug can be made. I wonder why they skim these details? And it’s not just these aspects, as scant attention is paid to how to actually hook, how wide the fabric strips should be, which are the best fabrics for rag rugs and why. Not to mention the variables: how far apart to make your loops depends on the thickness of your strips which depends on the fabric you are using. You are very much on your own with this craft.

[like pulling teeth]

It’s been hit and miss, trial and error here. I bought some secondhand cotton T-shirts from Emmaus (a wonderful organisation doing great things) to provide colour, but which I find difficult to use - it’s a bit like how I imagine pulling teeth must feel, only dozens of them at a time, one after the other (memories of visiting the fantastic, somewhat grisly dentistry collection at Liverpool University). I tried hessian, monks cloth, and linen backing material, all with disappointing results/itchy eyes. But then Vita Cochran kindly solved the problem. In answer to my (desperate) question she told me she uses Zweigart rug canvas, and this is what has turned out to work for me. That and a crochet hook.

Never would I have found this combination in a book.* And this is the problem with so many craft books: they simply tell you what to do rather than offering suggestions and alternatives, or helping you to work things out. I can say this because I have written a few, and I was always at pains to emphasise that there are no rules, so do what works for you. (My first quilt book was all about this.)

My rag rug is a bit of a contradiction, though. It’s actually made with cashmere ‘rags’. I love the fact that this is traditionally a thrift craft and yet it can make something which feels really luxurious. I bought a ludicrously good value 5kg sack of cashmere offcuts, textile waste which otherwise would otherwise go to landfill. So I am staying true to the nature of the craft - not that I think this is obligatory - just with a different material. I admit I initially found it difficult to work with such tastefully muted colours but once I’d added in strips from a bright pink moth-eaten jumper, I was back in my colour comfort zone.

I’ve also gone big. These strips are 2/2.5cm wide. I could cut them in half lengthways and pull up a loop through every hole. Or I can use them as they are, go every other hole, which is what I did and ended up with a nice tall springy pile into which my toes can sink.

I’m all for scaling up. It’s worked with smocking, and a hexagon quilt top I made a while ago. It means the work grows quickly, and confounds expectations. One book I found in the Cambridge University Library which was written by a man talked repeatedly of the ‘ladies’ who make rag rugs, and this was in 2001. You just know an oversize cashmere version would cause lip-pursing in some quarters.

I’ve also made a frilly knicker cushion cover using the shaggy method - short strips pulled through the backing fabric (monks cloth in this case). There is a triangle pattern in here but it disappears in the frilly mayhem, and quilting cotton isn’t the best fabric for this sort of rag rugging - it will flatten and fray - although solid colours are a lesson learned. Books don’t tell you that you need fabrics which have equal depth of colour on each side as both will show, so if you use printed fabric you get half and half pattern and pale/boring. Still, it’s jolly, colourful, great to ruffle and play with, and it was a useful experiment to see whether I prefer loops/pile or butterfly wings/mop head. I like both.

One more thing: I wrote a piece for the Hazel Press blog on Proust and hawthorn. You can read it here. Hazel Press is a lovely small publisher: thoughtful, many interesting authors and poets on highly contemporary and/or personal subjects, and really excellent covers.

Happy Sunday!

*Just found an honourable exception in the library: An Introduction to Rag Rugs by Jenni Stuart-Anderson