Lorenzo Castillo For The Rug Company

WORDS Malibongwe Tyilo

Spanish designer Lorenzo Castillo’s collection for The Rug Company draws on his skill for combining the past with the present for a perfectly contemporary look.

The collection features four different designs: Segovia takes its inspiration from a 15^th century Spanish house called ‘Casa de los Picos’. Here, Castillo interpreted the original house’s façade of granite blocks carved into pyramid-shaped reliefs, into a blue, grey and white single plane rug. Next up, the Isabella carpet looks to the renaissance architecture of Florence. In a colour palette of muted red and grey, the rug features images of layers of cut stone inspired by the façade of the famous Palazzo Strozzi.

“A continuous source of inspiration for me is classical architecture, which I like to rework into a modern interpretation. There is restraint in my design that comes from my Spanish heritage. But I try to surprise with a fresh perspective,” says Castillo.

Indeed, his fascination with the classical carries through to Escorial, a design which is inspired by the 16^th century marble floors of Spanish tradition, interpreted into a palette of ochre yellow and soft grey. His least architectural design, the Graphene carpet, looks to nature, to the carbon known as graphene, famous for its super strength and honeycomb lattice. Here he softens its sharp edge through the use of pale yellow and grey tones.

Handwoven by The Rug Company’s weavers in Nepal, the collection uses a chunkier knot, which gives it a thick pile and the added advantage of a lower price – from R13 950 per square metre to R69 948 for a rug measuring 9 x 6 inches.

The collection is available from The Rug Company’s showroom in Cape Town, and it can be custom ordered to suit your specific requirements. For more information, visit therugcompany.com.