Daily Details: July 22

Brinton Carpets was in the schedule for today and it was a very enjoyable day. I was blown away by the hospitality that the workers at Brinton’s showed us. They paid for our transportation there and once we arrived they had coffee (which I think they were very surprised since few of us drank it), water from a nice cold water cooler, and cookies. Our first presentation was an overview of the company and how they operate. Then we moved over to the archive and saw vintage rug designs, some of which date back to the 1400s. They were hand painted on a grid, much like a cross-stitch pattern and were amazingly preserved. I loved seeing these fantastic Japanese stencils that they had, but my favorite thing was these old French fabric books that were from the turn of the 20th century. I was absolutely blown away at how modern many of the patterns looked—it was inconceivable to me that they could be so old.

We had another small presentation about dying the wool and then they fed us lunch. There were some very delicious sandwiches, but also some terrifying hunks of fatty sausage encased in puff pastry stuff. It was interesting to see those. Then we visited where the designers work and saw the computer program they use to design. It was an incredible program and amazing to see how much work is put into each design. Our last stop was going inside the factory itself and being inches away from the machines that actually produce the rugs. There are so many machines and so many workers that have to man them that I can now see why the carpets cost so much. I couldn’t imagine how anyone could invent the machines that do this incredibly complex process. But then I thought of my dad and realized it would be someone like him that could do it. I have a whole new respect for what goes into making carpet.