The Crocheted Rug Page 2

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Two more examples of this type of construction are found in the coiled pottery and coiled basketry of the Navajo Indians. Both these crafts get their names from the type of their construction. The coiled pottery is only similar to the crocheted rug in its purely constructive features, for clay demands a different kind of surface decoration from cotton thread. The likeness in the coiled basket is closer to the crocheted rug for its material is more similar, and it too is built up stitch by stitch. The basket is made of grass fiber and the rug of strands of cotton cloth, and the stitch which is used to construct them is consistent with the material of which they are made. In both, the stitch, which is the unit of construction, produces the effect in .surface ornament of a succession of small squares, which follow the action of the coil from one widening curve to the other from the center of the rug out to the edge. Therefore as these structurally ornamental stitches produce the same kind of pat-tern in the rug as in the basket, any design which could be applied to one would also be suitable for the other, and the design for this rug has been adapted from a coiled basket made by the Navajo Indians. The colors used in it are colors which are also characteristic of the Navajo basket.

The design is abstract in character, for the stitch of the crocheted rug suggests a formal type of ornament. It is in fact almost geometrical but as the structural features in this rug are rather pronounced, this type of ornament harmonizes well with them.

The most successful plans for any kind of handicraft are those which have a tendency to weld together surface ornament and structure. Almost every technique develops two styles of design, one which is structural and one which appears in various forms of surface pattern.

 

The one can be best interpreted by line; the other by spots of tone or color value. Thus structural features become ornamental through the repetition of tone or color value on care-fully selected points of the line action.

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The Craft Of Handmade Rugs - View The Rest Of The Book

Introduction - Some Old Time Rugs - A Word About Dyes - The Braided Rug - The Scalloped Doormat Or Tongue Rug - The Knitted Rug - The Hooked Rug In Cotton And Wool - The Needle-Woven Rug
The Colonial Rag Rug - Some Applications - Newer Methods Of Stencil Making - The Tufted Counterpane
Old Time Lights - The Batik Or Wax Resist Process