Find a an area rug that fits the decorative styling of your great-room may have you stifled at the moment, but if you start thinking out of the box, or more importantly the “square”, and look at a braided round rug then your interior design lesson will be over in a short time. Braided rugs have been around for a few hundred years, but during the late 1800s and early 1900s the textile mills in the northeast united states started producing them at a wholesale pace, and have not looked back since.
A round rug is a great addition to a large living area with lots of open space, and by arranging the furniture around the flooring cover, it will become the lower centerpiece that truly ties the room together. An alternation of earthen colors will help blend your taupe or khaki color sofa and chairs in with the rest of the décor, and with a matching but slightly contrasting brown curtains that includes a beige paisley print your room will be of museum quality in show quality and perfect shading. The neutral tones will allow you also add color yellow, orange, and even navy blue decorative pieces to give the room a muted liveliness that is not in the average home.
The typical round rug can also be found in the foyer area of a home and is placed directly underneath the brushed nickel chandelier as almost as if the lighting is targeting the rug itself. If your entrance area has an odd shape that needs more coverage than what a circle can provide then an oval area rug should be place there instead. The color should pick up the highlights of the chandelier, any furniture, and or stained glass in the front door, and color the walls. Be sure and purchase the optional rug pad to go with it, as this will add even more comfort for the weary feet of visitors entering your home.
In the case of a more upscale custom home decorating scheme you will want to option for the Colonial Mills Elegance line of carpeting, as they use chenille yarns, plus thirty-five to forty percent wool to give the final product the most luxurious look and highest possible comfort for walking on that money can buy. The average price C.M.’s area rugs will be in the three hundred dollar range for a small to medium size, and for a large living room covering the prices will hover around the fifteen hundred dollar mark.
When it is time to tweak your country themed family room or breakfast nook then you will want to research braided rugs as alternative to conventional supplementary floor coverings. This form of carpeting dates back centuries and was once only made by hand in homes where budgets where tight and the only décor that could be afforded was created by the homeowner. Using rags, evacuated feed sacks, cloth flour and rice bags, and burlap-packaging material usually the wife and daughters would create the strips and braids to form the rug while sitting in their living room after the days work had been finished.
Although the original area rugs such as these may have been skewed with not so complementary color schemes, their utilitarian use, and decorative value was much higher in value since their impoverished lifestyle afforded them little if no money for such interior improvements of any kind. As homemakers became more adept at creating these handcrafted area rugs, they would make dyes from household products, and plants that would allow them luxury of creating a much more stylized floor covering that had a degree of character and charm. As the industrial revolution the United States came into full swing, textile mills started mass producing them with a more clean and fitted look.
The old world charm of what the farmer’s wives and children created was almost lost entirely, but a grassroots campaign started online has created a community of craft hobbyists that is bringing the tradition of hand prepared braided rugs back to life. There are e-books, DVD sets, and CD’s available to help the rug making neophyte get up to speed quickly and producing their own versions of this homespun piece of Americana. If you are over the age of forty or so, you may remember seeing these carpets in your grandparents home, as they were very popular during the 1940s and on into the early 1960s.
Although this category of area carpeting is a staple in many departments stores like JC Penny’s and Sears that are affordable for the average homeowner, there are high end or top shelf versions that can run into the several thousand dollar range. There are online vendors who have made a cottage industry out of creating made to order braided area rugs for their clients. They will cost more than one created in a factory, but well worth the benefit of having one made to your specifications of color, design, and materials used so the final product will blend in with the décor you already have in your home. In addition, by controlling the materials that are used in the construction process you can specify the use of fabric with natural dyes for persons with allergic reactions to certain commercial pigments.