Two houses obsessed with detail decided to work toward the same objective. Fornasetti brought the drawings, the strange and playful images it has been making for decades. cc-tapis brought the looms and years of treating a rug as something worth looking at rather than walking over. The collection sits between the two: Fornasetti's world, which has always lived on paper and porcelain, moved into wool and silk. The motifs are not printed onto a surface here. They are built into it, knot by knot.
How they are made
Nothing here is quick. The finest pieces are hand knotted using a Tibetan technique, over months rather than weeks. Others are hand embroidered by a collective of artisans in India. Others again are woven on a hand loom. The fibres were chosen for what each one does to a line: Himalayan wool for its sheen, merino for softness, silk for the way it throws light back. A Fornasetti drawing lives on precision, so the material had to hold the edge.
Collectible pieces, made by hand
The range runs wide, and most designs come in more than one colourway. Bocca, the lips, and Mano con gioielli, the jewelled hand, are among the wallhangings, made to be hung rather than walked on. Re sole and Rovine classiche bring the sun and the classical ruins onto floor formats, while Serratura and Musciarabia show how the same motif shifts entirely depending on the palette it is worked in. There are runners, squares, monumental sizes and small tapestries conceived as pieces to collect.
One piece above the rest
Il gattipanni is the centrepiece, hand knotted in Nepal and produced as a limited edition. It is also the clearest statement of what the collaboration is for. Whether it hangs on a wall or lies on a floor, a piece like this is not chosen to sit quietly in the background. Come discover Fornasetti and unique collectible pieces at Maison Territo, Royalmount, Montreal.
