Design Inspiration - Bolivian frazada blankets

About 9 years ago, my now husband and I took a 6 month trip to South America and Central America.
It was the coolest thing I had ever done.
Along the trip we collected many things that are in our home today and remind us of our travels.
In the majority of the countries we visited, textiles are a prominent piece of the culture.
In Bolivia, frazada blankets, are often found in vibrant color combinations. This was one of our favorite items that we brought home with us.

Bolivian Frazada blankets / throws - Leif shop 

In recent years, the trend of  hand-woven, cultural authenticity in textiles such as pillows and throws has continued to grow.
Products that incorporate the colors, textures and patterns found in these ancient hand-woven pieces add depth and interest to homes.

pillows from West Elm

The home of Cindy Crawford and Rande Gerber as seen in Architectural Digest show
that using vintage, hand-woven textiles add interest to a white sofa. 

Inspired by this trend and the Bolivian frazada blankets, similar to the one I brought back from my trip, I decided to design some rugs that mimic this style.

I focused on placement and overlap of color

Keep an eye out for more design inspiration posts with 2015 trends.
~Meredith

Get Outside

On a recent trip to San Francisco in May, I found myself in the most pleasant setting for an early morning cup of coffee with my husband.

Outside at the Stable Cafe, was this wonderful, shared garden space. The light was gorgeous and the whole environment, with the plants and pebbled ground was so peaceful and inspiring.

It had me looking forward to getting our outdoor space ready for that long awaited New England summer. 

Morning coffee on the deck and nights of outdoor dinners and lounging. 

I was mostly inspired here by the plants and the natural element that made this space so inviting. 

When it comes to outdoor spaces, sometimes all it takes is a few simple steps to make your space into that setting you dream of. (especially after long winters!)

Whether you live in the city, the country, or on the water, prefer an eclectic mix or clean and simple, here are a few images for your outdoor inspiration. . . 

Adding string lights and flowers is a simple and easy way to make a space feel warm and inviting.
Image via Pinterest 

A small balcony becomes a cozy outdoor hang out.
Image via Pinterest

A traditional deck adds a lounge-like elegance with over-sized cushions and chairs in bright white.
Image via Pinterest

Traditional meets rustic for a look that is truly New England.
Image via Pinterest

A gorgeous view needs only natural pieces that blend with the surrounding environment.
Image via Pinterest

An extension of the indoors.
Image via Elle Decor

A traditional home mixes modern pieces and patterns in black and white, with a touch of natural tones and textures.
Image via Pinterest

A patio full of greenery gets an eclectic mix of pattern and color.

Traditional covered porch with Moroccan-style influences.
Image via Pinterest

This porch keeps it clean and simple.
Image via Pinterest

This one says it all. . .
Image via Pinterest

Summer is here! Time to get outside.

~Meredith

A custom rug for a 6 year old . . .

This past April, my daughter's 6th birthday seemed like the perfect time to convince myself and my husband that we should make over her room.
All of a sudden the age of 6 seemed to call for the kind of room that went beyond just stuffed animals and play houses, to something she could really grow with. . . and keep organized on her own!
A real bed, paint in a color other than pink, a shelf to hold her new found love of chapter books, and of course. . . what every 6 year old wants, "a cool rug."
She is my kid after all.

Although we were making her room feel a bit more "big kid," I still believe in a kids' room being a kids' room. Meaning, there has to be some element of fun and chaos or mismatching happening. It has to feel like a kids room.
So when deciding on a rug, I wanted to do something different. I wanted it to be playful and colorful, but soft. I also wanted to challenge my manufacturing team a bit to see if they could achieve the look I was going for.
My inspiration was to have something geometric with stripes, which is how I came up with this initial drawing.

initial rug concept 

Our manufacturing team was on it and had no problem with the design, creating the separate pieces for each section, cutting them and piecing them together.

the rug is pieced together in sections

almost complete . . . awaiting fringe 

final rug in Nayeli's room 

The rug came out exactly how I had hoped. I love the yellow stripes and how it gives her room both color and softness. She was very happy. :)

~Meredith

Small accents

The last couple of months have been full of designing, creating and refining as we get ready to launch our newest offering of storage items this spring.
One focus has been on using new materials for some of our handle options.
Small accents can really make a difference in a piece such as storage.
Take a look to see what we've been up to.

cotton rope from knot & rope supply

This soft and simple cotton rope from Knot & Rope Supply is a perfect accent for those nautical / coastal inspired products.

Tote-style basket with long cotton rope handles.

Our new Nautical Stripe storage basket with cotton rope handles.

For something with a bit more contrast and some serious texture, I found this manila rope. Manila is a form of hemp, so it takes on that real natural feel.

I love how this simple change makes such a difference in these baskets on a kid-friendly shelf. The natural tones and texture provides a nice balance to the bright colors and white accents on the shelf.

manila rope from Knot & Rope Supply. 

manila rope handles on kids shelf storage.

~Meredith

Custom rug with Simply Grove

A few months back, we had the privilege and honor of working with Kirsten Grove, of the very awesome blog Simply Grove, on a custom rug design for a special project.

The rug and entire room look amazing! Check out Kirsten's feature on her blog here .We love it!
Read on below for details about the process of creating this custom rug.

photo credit ~ Kirsten Grove of Simply Grove

We started out with some basic concepts around the style Kirsten and her client were looking for: striped or geometric, vintage and southwestern styles.
They settled on this image of a rug I had modified from other designs and actually created for my own home.

sketch modifying a previous design

finished rug in my foyer 

Now that we had nailed down the design direction, it was time for us to talk about color!
I sent Kirsten a colonial mills' yarn pom, which is basically a big ring of all the yarns and fabric we carry in house. We encourage designers to use this pom as a working tool from which they can pick color combinations for their designs.

Kirsten's client, Kayla, getting ready to pick her colors from the yarn pom!
photo credit ~ Kirsten Grove of Simply Grove

They decided on a black and off-white color scheme for some real pop. The rug, meant for a dining room, also needed to be larger than the original design we were working from. Therefore, we had to work on the appropriate scale for the diamonds to get just the right look.

The rug getting some finishing touches in our Rhode Island factory

Thank you to Kirsten Grove and Kaley for including us in this project.
We had so much fun!

~Meredith

New Design Favorite

A new addition to Colonial Mills' standard line of rugs is a collection by the name of Windsor.
A wool blend design that applies a method of weaving small amounts of slightly contrasting colors for an overall look that adds both texture and dimension.

Windsor - charcoal

Windsor - charcoal shown at Las Vegas Market Winter 2014

Part of our new licensed Panama Jack collection, Windsor will be available on our website March 2014 and other major rug websites this spring.

~Meredith

This week in prototypes

It's been a flurry of a week. . . no pun intended.
Snow and prototypes and projects have kept us all so busy here!
A couple of quick pics to show you a bit of what we've been up to.
Getting excited about the new items we'll be adding this spring!

New storage prototypes

Colorful new weave

Have a great weekend!

~Meredith

Las Vegas Market Summer 2012

ok. . . post time. . . finally.

Been a while.
I'm currently at the Las Vegas Market at the World Market Center.
This market we introduced new yarns and fabrics that will be turning up in 2013 product, as well as private label and custom projects.
Pretty excited about these. Some fabulous color popping up and of course. . .texture.
Take a look!

37 colors of polypropylene yarn 

New spacedye yarn in bright colors displayed as a wall mount.
Chenille bobbins and storage add to the pop of color.

New spacedye blend of warm tones

Image collage - A glimpse into all things CMI . . . prototypes, factory images,
yarn, special projects and events

Natural wool and soft chenille combine for some serious texture

A natural wool storage

Stay tuned for some upcoming posts about more new product and color stories. . .
Thanks for reading!
-Meredith

Organized Chaos

It's a fast-paced world out there.

Technology is booming. 

Your new smart phone is probably already being replaced by a better, even faster model. 

More apps.

More ways to share.

More info, quicker. . . all at your finger tips.

And then there's the financial crisis. 

We try to keep up with the advances in technology and the various platforms and we work to thrive and succeed through a financial crisis.

This fast-paced, ever-changing and, at times, stressful world also makes for a busy home.

The environment of the outside world directly impacts the environment we strive to create in our homes.

In times of chaos, it is typical that we begin to feel a pull towards things that will make us feel comfortable, more organized, less cluttered. 

We gravitate towards nature and bring more of the calming aspects in nature into our interior spaces, as well as the comforts of family, friends and food.
Additionally and somewhat contradictory, we are drawn to bright pops of colors.
In Pantone's first issue of Tones, an edition exploring color trends in design and consumer reactions, Leatrice Eiseman, executive director of the Pantone Color Institute explains how these bright and invigorating hues boost confidence in consumers, while natural tones provide versatility that is more practical.

This increase in offerings in the storage category, goes hand in hand with consumer reactions to the economic and technological climate of recent years.
Consumers are purchasing these various forms of storage as a way to bring more organization to the home while adding natural elements or bright pops colors, depending on their space and preference.
In product design at CMI, we have been busy creating storage in various sizes, shapes and constructions in natural materials, as well as bright, fun colorful options in materials that can be meant for both indoor and outdoor applications.

left to right clockwise: indoor/outdoor dipped storage, solid storage (image via Joss & Main), Parkview baskets bring indoor comfort and storage to a three-season porch, Natural Style storage for entry way and the bedroom (images via One Kings Lane),  rectangle storage for linen closet (image via One Kings Lane), bright indoor/outdoor storage in a houndstooth tweed, Natural Wool Houndstooth basket in 100% natural wool.

Check us out in some of these upcoming sales:
May 2 - One Kings Lane indoor&outdoor storage
May 4 - One Kings Lane kids' corner storage
May 20 - Rue La La outdoor storage

Get organized . . . be happy.
-Meredith

March. . . color and clean-up take us into spring

left to right : over 40 custom rugs coming through for a hotel project, fresh new colors in the works for 2013 fabrics, 2012 color swatch featuring new wool blends, chenille and polypropylene, bulls-eye basket in bright orange, work day with mommy, mini baskets in bright-colored tweeds, CMI branded event on Rue La La, office organization, kids rug prototypes for a customer, porch make-over with naturalized polypropylene rug and baskets, new cablelock tweed design, more prototypes.

We're ready for spring with all this color and clean-up.
Lot's to do in April . . . looking forward to another great month!

-Meredith


.

February. . . a little love and a whole lot of product

Check out what kept us busy throughout the month. . .

left to right Going green with some natural yarn, storage event on One Kings Lane, meetings in NYC, tote bag prototype, wrapped up a great Las Vegas market in our new showroom, cmi love, kid rug prototypes, my new read, new basket design I'm loving, CT skyline a good start to the day and time to head back home, prototypes freshly sewn, Restoration Hardware 2012 Outdoor catalog featuring Sunbrella rugs.

All in all a busy, but great month with so much to do. A successful Las Vegas market and meetings with some wonderful customers. . . thanks to all!
And now onto March. . . looking forward to some spring.
-Meredith

2012 New Collections

This year, we debuted 4 new collections at the 2012 markets in both Atlanta and Las Vegas; Natural Wool Houndstooth, Elmwood, Tiburon and Brooklyn.
The trends this year consisted of natural tones, warm hues and texture.

In response to the expanding palette of neutrals in the market, we added 8 new polypropylene colors to our offering that includes grays, browns and naturals.
Additionally, we introduced new constructions and color pairings that provide style and design that is both transitional and practical.

Take a peek below for additional info and photos of the new collections.

Natural Wool Houndstooth
All natural, un-dyed wools come together in a unique cablelock tweed design creating a Houndstooth pattern. A highly durable and eco-friendly option that adds sophistication and comfort.
Available in 6 colorways: Cream, Latte, Tea, Caramel, Cocoa, Espresso.

Natural Wool Houndstooth Collection - HD36-Espresso, HD31-Cream, HD33-Tea

Natural Wool Houndstooth Collection - HD32-Latte, HD34-Caramel, HD36-Espresso

texture shot of natural wool houndstooth - HD36  Espresso

Natural Wool Houndstooth Collection - HD32 Latte rug and basket

Elmwood
A soft, easy blend of natural tones with just a hint of color creating a design that works with any pattern. Ideal for bedrooms and living rooms. Constructed of flat braid wool-blend and polypropylene yarns.
Available in 6 colorways: Stonewash, Denim, Tarragon, Rosewood, Evergold and Bark.

Elmwood Collection - EM59-Denim, EM79-Rosweood, EM99-Bark

Elmwood Collection - EM49-Stonewash, EM89-Evergold, EM69-Tarragon

Tip: If you're a fan of lots of pattern, try the Elmwood rug under a bed dressed in multi-colored quilts or use it in a living room to create a soft, beach-like feel.

Brooklyn
A fun, updated design to a traditional shape in natural, earthy colors.
Combining both flat and cablelock constructions gives this rug the added element of texture.
Made of 100% polypropylene
Indoor/outdoor
Available in 7 colorways: Brownstone, Slate, Blue Haze, Moss, Terracotta, Natural, Amber Way

Brooklyn Collection - BN19-Brownstone, BN89-Natural

Brooklyn Collection - BN79-Terracotta

Tiburon

An updated shape takes a traditional flat braiding mix of natural and earthy tones to create warmth and style.

100% polyproplene.

Indoor/Outdoor

Available in 6 colorways: Stone Blue, Dockside, Misted Gray, Spruce Green, Rusted Rose, Sandstorm.

Tiburon Collection - TB69-Spruce Green, TB79-Rusted Rose, TB49-Misted Gray, TB09-Stone Blue

Tiburon Collection - TB19-Dockside, TB89-Sandstorm, TB49-Misted Gray

Tiburon Collection - TB79-Rusted Rose runner and basket

New collections are currently being added to our website and will officially be ready to order March 1.

Please feel free to contact us for more information regarding these new collections.

Comments welcome!

Thank you! 

Meredith