All of Tapistelar’s rugs are made to order using manual looms and fique fibre with pure copper, stainless steel and/or brass threads; or only in natural fique fibre if preferred.

Designed in Rome and produced in Bogotá, the studio’s refined pieces are handwoven mainly from Furcraea fibre, known locally as fique, by skilled Colombian artisans. Honouring a centuries old technique, each rug requires a laborious weaving process that takes up to 40 days to complete.

The fibres used in our designs come from fique plants grown and processed by local families in the mountainous region of Santander, Colombia. To extract the fibres from the leaves, they cut the outermost layer of the plant –so that it may continue growing– and manually remove the pulp. The resulting fibres are dried in the sun, while the pulp is used as fertiliser in nearby crops.

The dried fibres are then immersed in boiling water, dyed with natural dyes, and once again sun-dried. Next, they comb the fibres to soften them and separate the short fibres from the long ones, as only the latter are used to weave the carpets in manual looms once transferred to Bogotá.