rag rugs

[bykerlads]

Just adding to the re-cycling of rag-rugs theme:
having checked with an elderly relative, I found that the rugs would be gradually relegated to more lowly uses as they became more worn - from livingroom to kitchen to inside doormat, and thence to outside mat in the porch/passage. Sometimes the rugs would then be used as extra insulation in winter on hen-hut roofs and cold-frames before finally being thrown onto the compost heap ( not sure if they ever bio-degraded sufficiently to become garden compost!!)

[bykerlads]

Have just had a word with my mother  ( b. 1928) about rag-rugs:
As newly-weds in 1948, she and my dad used to spend evenings in their 2-room rented house ( lucky to get even that, as housing was in short supply after the war), making rag-rugs together using the family's communal frame.
The floors were stone covered with lino and the only way to get rugs was to make your own.
Mum and Dad came a long way from that set-up in 1948 ( 2 rooms, outside earth closet toilet + water from pump in the yard) to a centrally-heated, fully, fitted carpeted bungalow by the mid-1960's!
Well done, Mum and Dad!

[Billyblue]

Rag rugs were also made in Australia!
I remember as a child, in the war years, we learnt to make them, but not with hessian that I remember.  They were just made on a frame and closely interwoven, not in woolen cloth but cotton cloth (it's hotter out here).  When they were cut off the frame they ended up with a nice little fringe.
Usually only to a size of a doormat and used also for Mum to stand on the cold floor in the laundry which is also where we did our washing up.

        

Dawn M

[raggybaggylin]

thank you for this. Are you also able to tell me any more about rag rugs in Australia? Do you think it was introduced by the British people? Did you use rug hooks? What period/decade would you be talking about?

[Billyblue]

I have no idea who 'introduced' it, but seeing that a lot of Aussies at that time (more so than now) had UK ancestry, I guess that's probably where it came from.

I had always thought it was a product of the war years when we couldn't get carpets and lots of other things, but maybe it was a way of 'making do' from way way back, by the sound of it.

Period?  I was at primary school in the 1940s, during and just after WW2.  I vaguely remember using large crochet hooks to pull the pieces through.

Dawn M

[raggybaggylin]

Many thanks,Dawn.

[rancegal]

I've just seen this thread. We had a 'peg rug' (as they were called here in Northamptonshire) in the 1950s that I remember vividly. We had others of course, made by my mother, but I remember that particular one. It depicted a thatched cottage with a colourful front garden and a path leading to a gate in the hedge. The sky was blue and a few birds were flying. Mum made up the design herself. It was made from worn-out clothing on a base of a (washed) hessian potato sack. The tool she used was home made and was made from half a gypsy peg* cut to a thinner point. She also made plaited rugs where the old clothes were cut into long strips and plaited together. Then the plait was coiled and stitched into an oval shape. I think I had one on my bedroom floor (on top of the lino). They were very heavy and almost impossible to wash, just a surface clean.

* These were pegs made by proper Romanies who came round every year. They would take willow twigs of about half an inch in diameter and cut 3-4 inch lengths which were cut in half lengthways and whittled to a rounded point at one end. With the two flat sides together, a narrow band of tin was put round the non-pointed end had held in place with a small tack. When the tin band broke, the two halves could be whittled to a narrower point and used for rug-making. It was definitely a make-do and mend thing.

     Gypsy pegs:  http://gallery.nen.gov.uk/asset78002-.html

[bykerlads]

It seems that rag-rugs are in fashion again!!
I noticed some today in a shop- they were made out of rather flossy looking fabric pieces, maybe nylon. Rather nice looking in pastel colours, not at all like the heavy, oily woollen cloth rugs of my childhood.
Maybe I should buy one for old times' sake, a bit of nostalgia.
I wonder if the modern ones are made by hand or machine- must go back to shop and have a closer look.

[giraffe]

Just a little memory - my maternal grandmother had a rag rug in front of the big grate in their back room. I remember staying there in 1947 and being fascinated by the materials in the rug. The one I remember best was a navy blue with a very narrow white stripe. Many years later I realised that I had seen my grandfather in a suit of this material some years earlier!
I still have a 'rug hook' in my workbox, and a woollen rug I made for my bedroom when I was a teenager in the early sixties.
giraffe