Besau Marguerre’s New Rug Collection for Reuber Henning.

What is design capable of? In the best-case scenario, it can reimagine a product—just as Besau Marguerre did with RIB. When the Hamburg-based studio received the call from Berlin-based rug company, Reuber Henning, to design a woven rug collection for them, Eva Marguerre and Marcel Besau began by questioning everything considered certain.

“We prefer to develop new projects by researching materials and handicraft techniques,” says Marguerre. The result is unusually three-dimensional rugs with strong ribs. While woven rugs are usually flat—flat weave being the technical term—the RIB collection has a colour-contrasting, linear relief structure. This makes the rugs particularly lively, soft and tactile.

For Reuber Hennig, RIB is one of the very first collaborations with external designers. Until now, Franziska Reuber and Birgit Krah had mostly designed their knotted and woven rug collections themselves. Besau Marguerre, who have already worked for clients such as Vitra, Thonet, Schönbuch and e15, and designed interiors for the Elbphilharmonie, are now adding a new design language to Reuber Henning‘s portfolio with RIB.

“We like the fact that Besau Marguerre approached the subject of woven rugs in such an unconventional way,” says Birgit Krah. “It was a lot of fun working together.” Franziska Reuber adds, “Their sensitivity to materials and colours goes well with our own way of working.”

After a series of experiments, Besau Marguerre decided on a novel combination of two types of fabric, a rib and double weave. The rib weave is used for the raised ribs, which are extra thick due to the use of a particularly large number of weft threads. The stripes in between are woven in double weave, which allows for a colour change. In a departure from convention, the fringes are knotted from the weft threads, not from the warp. The special design of the RIB collection emphasises the artisanal character of the rugs hand woven in India. The high-quality wool yarns really come into their own. Colour contrasts in rhythmic alternation create tension and make the rugs quite literally shine. The clear, graphic stripe pattern in turn ensures that the RIB collection finds its place in every interior and in every style.

The RIB collection is available in two sizes and with three rib variants—fine, medium and double. There‘s also a choice of four different colour combinations, from subtle to strong and rich in contrast. For more information, visit reuberhenning.com.

Related: TSAR Carpets Introduces Hand-Tufted Rug Collection, Forma.

[Images courtesy of Reuber Henning.]