Plaisio

Wool is an animal fibre, most often derived from sheep fleece. Wool was already being spun as early as 5,000 BC. In Roman times, wool, leather and linen were the main materials used to make clothes. With the progressive development of mechanical processes and the evolution of breeding techniques, wool became the economic lung of several countries in the Xth century, and again in the XIIth. Renowned for its thermal and sound insulation properties, wool also offers the advantage of absorbing moisture. It is a noble and timeless material, used from time immemorial for its strength and durability. PINTON uses local wool with shorter carded fibres, which make it fluffier and give it more volume, or a specific type of wool from New-Zealand with long combed fibres that are more resistant to heavy traffic. Both types of wool are spun (carded or combed) and dyed in the spinning plant located in Felletin. Whether they are made in 100% pure virgin wool or blended with other materials like linen, silk, bamboo, leather or many others, PINTON wool rugs and carpets bring comfort and quality.

Tencel®, which is a registered trademark and another name for lyocell, is produced from wood pulp, usually eucalyptus. It emerged very recently in the textile industry: made for the first time at the end of the 1980s, it was marketed in 1992. Produced in Europe, this material is particularly innovative. Its production process is very quick since it takes only two hours from wood harvesting to spinning. Cultivating the timber necessary to its production is a particularly clean process: it needs very little water and no pesticides. This textile fibre is very soft to the touch, elastic, resistant and durable. It has excellent moisture absorption properties while remaining dry on the surface. Lyocell lends itself perfectly to blending with other materials and gives PINTON rugs a very smooth contemporary twist.

Alexandra Roussopoulos is a Swiss/Greek artist born in Paris. She studied at the Camberwell College of Art in London and the École Nationale Supérieure des Beaux-Arts in Paris. Interested in the issue of transmission, shared experience and engagement, she teaches in the Prép’art preparation school and participates in many workshops in France and abroad. In her paintings, she questions the dialogue between shapes, colours and space. Since the beginning, her work has been bearing witness to the importance of relationships with other people. She collaborates regularly to art projects and takes part in many artists residencies in China, Greece, Ireland, Slovenia and Algeria.

A powerful interaction between shapes and colours is at play in her essentially abstract pieces, painted with a wide brush, expressing both structure and spontaneity. PINTON was immediately seduced by Alexandra Roussopoulos’s paintings, with one idea in mind: laying her art on the floor. The family business and the artist collaborated on a first collection of rugs, woven with a mix of materials and displaying Alexandra Roussopoulos’s trademark beautiful textures, colours and shapes.

The hand tufting technique is a process combining centuries-old skills and modern weaving tools. The canvas is perfectly stretched over an upright loom and the craftsperson transfers by hand the future design of the rug with the utmost precision. Threads are inserted manually, one by one, working with a gun on the back of the canvas, following the colours, the drawing and the different tuft heights. PINTON was one of the first manufactories to use the gun tufting technique to produce some of its rugs and carpets and is the only French workshop offering very high quality tufted rugs. With this technique, production times are reduced compared to the knotted stitch weave or point noué. Finally, hand tufting offers a large range of possible depths. Carving is the technique that consists in sculpting the wool and creating textures within the woven rug. Since the early 1990s, PINTON has been specialising in the production of hand tufted rugs for which it also collaborates with famous designers and artists.