ATLANTA — September 22, 2021 — Fashioned in the finest natural fibers, with a sublime and sensory feel, Enkay celebrates the ancient craft of rug-making with the launch of its premier collection, Origins, on September 13, 2021. As the world moves into the future, works by hand remain a touchstone connecting to the past.

Featuring 23 different styles, talented weavers based in their home villages of India have lovingly produced a range of top-quality, unique, and distinctive designs under the auspices of Enkay. These hand-made works of art will now be available to collectors of fine home furnishings nationwide. Styled for modern living, Enkay has one simple, noble intention: to make hand-made, high-quality rugs attainable. Retail price points start at $500 and will be available through its e-commerce site .

The inaugural collection houses a variety of subtle and sophisticated neutral tones and a mix of textures to adorn inside spaces and beautify any home environment. Born out of the intense desire to honor centuries of workmanship, Enkay artisans use only the finest materials like un-dyed New Zealand wool and employ the technique of using hand carding, hand knotting and hand finishing. Enkay brings warmth to rooms and texture to life, with understated color gradations, high/low pile contrasts, refined geometric patterns, and exquisite craftsmanship.

Asha Chaudhary, CEO, and co-founder of Enkay, daughter of the legendary N.K. Chaudhary of Jaipur Living, India’s largest manufacturer of hand-knotted rugs, proudly carries on the legacy of her father’s devotion to respecting and supporting makers, weavers, and designers whose creations have passed through generations. Enkay, as a woman-led business, has intensely focused on empowering women and their families to secure the future of hand-made rugs, as well as creating her aesthetically driven, direct-to-consumer luxury brand.

“Weaving is an ancient art. In creating Enkay, we have connected customers with artisans practicing these timeless skills in villages across India. We connect directly with makers and remove complexity from our ecosystem, ensuring each person in the chain is paid fairly for their contribution. We can ensure the highest ethical standards are upheld through this model, and a totally fair value exchange occurs. Weavers and their communities thrive. Additionally, by investing in these communities, through skills training, education, and health initiatives, we’re able to support these vital crafts and the people who practice them, making them sustainable for generations to come,” Chaudhary says.

Enkay is designed for modern living, bringing welcome texture into any home, and making it possible to see a classic design with fresh eyes. The hand-woven rugs are fashioned in jute or ultra-soft wool and are virtually stain and water-resistant making it easy to live with for kids and pets, handcrafted for life. In addition, Enkay’s rugs are an environmentally conscious way to incorporate naturally beautiful elements into the home, as synthetic rugs contain toxic dyes and emit harmful VOCs (volatile organic compounds). Colorways include bright whites, soft creams, pale beiges, and subtle greys.

Some highlights from the Enkay Origins collection of rugs include:

• Sarvan – Sarvan is inspired by the individualism of a rug worked on by multiple weavers using multiple yarns on a single piece. In Sarvan, the tonal variations of undyed wool combine with yarns woven at different tensions to create a textured piece that’s both casual and cosmopolitan. Hand-woven from hand-spun and carded Afghan wool, Sarvan retains the wool’s prized length, strength and luster in the finished rug. Sarvan is ideal for adding a bit of luxury to modern life.
• Adras – An undyed, natural palette, braided fringe, and contrasting, high/low pile makes Adras feel like modernity meets Moroccan style. Crafted from lustrous, hand-carded wool, Adras is hand-knotted then hand-trimmed with shears to create a subtle texture that evokes a field of diamonds. Taking just under three months to make, Adras is form without formality, ease without edge—providing a perfect backdrop to a casual contemporary home.
• Tigaria – Tigaria is an updated Moroccan style. The variation in color inherent in natural sheep’s wool creates a delicate linear pattern, with no two rugs the same. The soft pile and easy design make it a perfect backdrop to a casual contemporary home. With a natural sheen to the wool and a contrasting high/low pile, Tigaria’s boho style makes it a natural complement to a modern space.
• Sarnic – Sarnic echoes the tribal patterns woven long ago in the Kars region of modern-day Turkey. The difference is in its palette. Rendered in neutral shades rather than the rich hues of tribal carpets, Sarnic trades traditional boldness for calm classicism. Sarnic is noted for its especially solid, lush feel, which is created by a complex knotting technique that produces a flat-woven feel from a cut pile.

Enkay’s Origins collection is a statement of intent, crafted to express enduring subtlety and effortless luxury. This foundational collection has been shaped using the lightest touch. It imbues understated design with the depth and movement inherent to natural materials. Origins embraces contrast and the character of the rugs emerges in the space between design and making. It draws on tradition but lives just outside of time.

Posted September 22, 2021

Source: Enkay

ZURICH,
 Switzerland — September 22, 2021 — Founded in 1846 and originally known as the “Seidentrocknungsanstalt Zürich” (Silk Conditioning Institute), TESTEX is one of the oldest companies in Switzerland. The institute’s core business was determining the commercial weight of raw silk. However, the second half of the 20th century saw the decline of the silk industry, and the company underwent a transformational process. It began to extend its testing to other fibers and was renamed to TESTEX in 1970.

Its transformation into a leading independent testing institute for human ecology began in the early 1990s, and TESTEX joined the OEKO-TEX® Association in 1993. The association and its founding institutes have spent almost three decades envisioning a sustainable textile industry and pride themselves on being pioneers in sustainability solutions. Consumers and brands alike are increasingly selecting products and companies that demonstrate action and make commitments on key environmental topics like water usage and climate change.

A variety of modern testing equipment is available for both physical textile testing and analytical tests. The most modern and up-to-date testing equipment and software now allows laboratory staff to process their results competently at home and to control devices remotely, which has been an important part of TESTEX’s digitalization process.

Today TESTEX focuses on a holistic approach, offering its customers complete solutions to successfully take on the sustainability challenges that the fashion industry faces today.

Posted September 22, 2021

Source: TESTEX AG, Swiss Textile Testing Institute

BIELLA, Italy — September 22, 2021 — FiloFlow, Filo’s sustainability project which has been launched for some years, is increasingly developing. The number of exhibiting companies participating in it is constantly raising.

The 56th edition of Filo confirms the centrality that the theme of sustainability has gained for the whole textile industry. Consequently, the FiloFlow project will have an even higher visibility compared to the past: it will be indeed the focus of the new Sustainability Area, comprehensive of a specific trend area of FiloFlow companies. Almost all exhibiting companies have now joined the FiloFlow project. And the approach that Filo wanted to give to the project also contributes to its success: the goal is to enhance productions carried out according to sustainable criteria and processes related to environmental and ethic profile. All this with a perspective of supply chain, the only way to reach a truly traceable and sustainable end-product. In fact, as has been the case for some years, a group of dyeing mills are present at the 56th edition of Filo, showing their solutions for environmentally responsible textile products.

Posted September 22, 2021

Source: Filo

ADLINGTON, England — September 22, 2021 — After 18 months of global supply chain disruption, workwear fabric manufacturer Carrington Textiles, revealed the company’s challenges during this period and the growth its supply chain team has been through to be able to maintain the company’s high levels of service.

Since early 2020, the COVID-19 pandemic caused a whole new set of challenges for Carrington Textiles, ranging from the team having to adapt to a new dynamic way of doing things remotely, to lockdowns and positive cases around the world impacting the availability of raw materials and freight.

Brexit was another big task for Carrington Textiles, as the company had to find ways for establishing new procedures that adhered to the Trade Cooperation Agreement (TCA) with the European Union to ensure products could still be shipped to customers without unnecessary delays

Additionally, the Suez Canal blockage which lasted six days, had a severe impact on the supply chain, generating even further delays on blank sailings, loops changing and unforeseen transhipments.

With the rollout of the vaccine program and the coronavirus pandemic restrictions gradually easing in many countries around the world, Carrington Textiles saw a considerable increase in demand from the beginning of 2021, a situation to which it had to respond quickly to meet customers’ expectations.

Supply Chain Director for Carrington Textiles Stuart Pritchard explained: “We have seen in 2021 extraordinarily high levels of demand in comparison to 2020, which were higher than we could have predicted. We worked in collaboration with our internal teams to understand where we produce fabrics, ensuring we have the right raw materials in the right place, at the right time. With a multisite operation in the UK, Portugal for EU origin fabrics and Pakistan, these challenges were complex.”

The supply chain boost

Stuart outlines what has changed in Carrington Textiles’ supply chain and how is this benefiting not only customers but the environment.

“We have introduced a new warehouse in Portugal with a bespoke management tool written by our own IT team, so we have full control on the system and its features.

“We’ve also had to restructure the entire supply chain team by adding 50 percent more talent in order to ensure we have the right competence operating at the right level to meet our customers’ needs. We looked outside the textile industry to find the best people with a wide range of experience and ideas that can improve our service to customers.

“With this growth, the team is not only able to implement new customs procedures and documentation, but also to spend more time analyzing and improving processes, stock performance, global production capacity utilization and ensuring our worldwide raw material needs are fit for purpose.

“Because it’s important for us to have access to the right data at the right time and in the right format we have also invested in a demand planning tool that will produce forward sales, production and stock projections and help manage our business in order to meet that all our customers’ expectations. This will no doubt enable us to be more agile and predict where we need to focus our efforts to ensure smooth operations through what’s been a very tough couple of years for supply chains.

“This new technology will also make our supply chain a lot more sustainable and environmentally friendly, as it will help us ensure we are not purchasing and shipping more product than needed. I believe in managing our capacity needs and production facilities ahead, so we utilize our assets efficiently and don’t waste energy”.

Posted September 22, 2021

Source: Carrington Textiles