Renewed Spirit

In a small workshop near Saint-Tropez, 20 talented artisans practise the venerable art of carpet weaving on 19th-century Jacquard looms. Here, as it has for almost a century, French company La Manufacture Cogolin defines the underfoot masterpiece.

The process may be ancient, but contemporary inspiration makes the collection (which ranges from custom-made carpets to sumptuous bath mats) essential for interior designers and architects looking for floor coverings that are more like works of art. Cogolin rugs adorn the floors of the Élysée Palace, the Palace of Versailles and French embassies around the world. The brand has also been a favourite of fashion brands and designers such as Karl Lagerfeld and Hubert de Givenchy for their private residences.

The Jacquard loom, which uses a highly complex system of needles, a cylinder and punch cards to create elaborate patterns, is integral to the Cogolin story. In 1928, French businessman Jean Lauer bought a young handknotted carpet studio that had grown out of a silk workshop located on the premises, and sent the fabric looms from his Lyon workshop there. In the 1960s, these looms were adapted to weave the carpets for which La Manufacture Cogolin is best known today.

Cogolin had always worked with the leading artists and designers of the day, including Eileen Gray and Jean-Michel Frank, but by the 1990s hardships faced by the French textile industry had reversed the company’s fortunes. By the time Hong Kong-based rug specialist House of Tai Ping stepped in to acquire Cogolin in 2010, the establishment was almost derelict. ‘It was a major investment, but we could see that it had enormous potential,’ says Cogolin’s Paris-based managing director Sarah Henry. ‘La Manufacture Cogolin is part of the history of French decoration, and we had an incredible resource in the unique looms and archives of samples, photographs, paintings and drawings that bridge Cogolin’s unique heritage and contemporary design.’ The new owners restored the original building and looms, working with the expert weavers to create new designs using traditional techniques, integrating modern technologies with authentic weaving traditions and creating a custom 200-colour palette.

The shift in public interest towards the handcrafted and sustainable, and today’s predilection for working with artists and designers, means that Cogolin’s traditional methods are back in vogue, but for Henry there is no contradiction between modern design and hand-weaving.

In 2015, Paris-based architect and designer India Mahdavi introduced her bold, contemporary take on the traditional kilim with the Jardin d’Intérieur collection, which elevates the classic single-repeat kilim pattern into six versions that are reassembled using varying pile heights and a riotous infusion of colours such as mustard, purple, chocolate, green and red. The result is as seductive as it is unexpected. More recently, the Venice-based Zaven design studio’s Vibes showed a twodimensional pattern made using a tapestry technique in black and white tones as an innovative pillow-rug-futon.

To Henry, the collections are ‘a poignant mix of traditional craft and contemporary design that is relevant for today and yet remains true to the Cogolin spirit.’