The ancient power of designs

An interior design only is a success if it can transform the space

The creation of designs is in people's nature. Designs are very ancient. Where societies arose, you quickly see decorative lines and structures appear as body decoration or decoration of pottery. Me fascinates mainly what designs, textures and colours do with a space. I have the intuitive urge to give identity to a place. I see a place in my head and from this inner image my design is created. Maybe I am more like an interior designer wanting to give identity to a place by designing products. I have created two designs for printing carpet: ‘Diamond en Origami’. For me a design is a success if it can transform the space. In that aspects these patterns have a big impact.

The world translated to a carpet pattern

From the things I see around me I make a graphical translation. In comparison to what you would think the project carpet 'Diamond' is not inspired by diamonds, but by the image of moving leaves. The sparks of light you see when to sun shines through the leaves, the ever changing transparency and compaction. This effect I wanted to apply in the pattern of a carpet. The pattern 'Diamond' is also in movement, you see something else all the time, a triangle, then again a hexagon or a diamond.

A flowing gradient from uni to pattern is one of the starting points of my designs

I doesn't always have to be so poetic, all kind of things can inspire me. 'Origami' is a project carpet based on the Japanese folding art. Not the folded figurines, but the manual, such beautiful folding patterns full of crossing lines and open fields. That interplay between lines and background I used for the carpet. The starting point is for the gradient between pattern and uni to be very fluent, creating no strongly restricted fields on the carpet. Giving the floor different areas, but remaining one field.

Printing carpet is big sized printing

It was exciting to translate the designs to a printed carpet. Just like with paper printing, you make a test print first, but carpet is no newsprint. The piled yarn has a lot of influence on the lines. On top of this there is the effect between the uni background colour and the colour of the lines. It was a educational trajectory. I really got the know the material and technique. A new design is already in the making.

Lianne Kuijpers is conceptual designer. She graduated in 2008 from the Design Academy in Eindhoven and has made many designs for furniture and curtain fabrics, wall covering, rugs and carpet.