Rug of the Month: March 2019

March’s Rug of the Month is an older project – Ania finished it 6 years ago, in March 2013. Jane McGown Flynn created the pattern, and it’s named “Fruit.” The rug’s dimensions are 11″ by 13.5″, and Ania hooked it in #3 strip wool.

Read on below to learn more about Ania’s finished “Fruit” project, and to see images of the completed rug:

Ania’s finished “Fruit” rug.

Why did you decide to take on this project? 

This was a piece required for the McGown teacher certification. It was taught by Stacey van Dyne at Northern McGown Teachers Workshop. The class was focused on learning fine shading and contour shading techniques to hook 3-D objects.

How did you approach color planning this project?

Stacey had swatches to chose from for the different pieces of fruit. I decided on a red apple, a bosc pear, and purple grapes. I chose to make purple plums instead of yellow-orange apricots.

I also chose to incorporate the color of the fruits elsewhere in the rug. The veins of the leaves are taken from the colors used for the plums and the pear. The low lights in the apple are adapted from the darkest value of the grapes.

I knew I wanted to have a light background for this piece. I chose a textured wool, a strip, and cut it against the strips so that you can’t tell that’s what it is when it was hooked into the rug. The end result reminds me of oatmeal, which goes well with the fruit!

The red from the apple is reflected in the plums and grapes, and the purple from the grapes is incorporated into the leaves.

What did you most enjoy about this project?

This project is the first time I really payed attention to the reflection of light. I learned how to hook high lights, low lights, and reflected light. This is a lesson that I carried over to all of my projects after this one.

When you look at this rug, you can see the highlights very clearly in the apple. you can also see a little bit of a highlight in the plums. In terms of reflected light, you can see the red of the apple is reflected in the plums, the grapes, and the pear. The grapes are reflected in the pear. Next time you’re looking at something that you might hook as a still life, take note of how the lights and colors are reflected in other objects. Keep that in mind in your future rug hooking projects!

The key colors used for the fruit (purple, gold, and red) are reflected throughout the pattern, and so you provide the eye a path to move along the entire rug without getting stuck in any one part. That is what you want to achieve in any still life, landscape, or floral rug. The eye should not be fixated on any one part of the rug.

In this pattern, the apple is right in the middle, but the eye doesn’t focus solely on the apple, it travels throughout the rug.

The purple from the grapes and the red from the apple are both reflected in the pear, and the darkest value from the grapes is used for the low lights in the apple.

Is there anything else of note about this project? 

I used different techniques while hooking the leaves. One was purely contour shaded, one was only fine shaded. I incorporated the fruit colors into the leaves, and played around with vein colors. It was a lot of fun!

May your rug hooking be fruitful! 😉

If you have any questions for Ania, feel free to leave them in the comments below!