How Our Braided Rugs Are Made

All braided rugs offered at CabinLivin.com come from a single, exclusive braided rug manufacturer.  This allows us to work directly with the maker of your new braided rug and assures consistency of quality, color, construction and, most important, your satisfaction.  Following is a general description of the process that ultimately results in your new, made to order, custom braided rug.

BRAID:

First and foremost, know that our braided rugs are genuine, created with true flat braid made in the traditional manner.  There are no fillers, blends, tubes or other ingredients to the braid used to create our braided rugs. The braid is created by our manufacturer as part and parcel to the process of producing each, unique, custom braided rug we offer.

MATERIALS:

There are two materials used in the production of each braided rug; the yarn used to create the braid and the thread, used to sew the braided rows together to create the rug pattern, design and size selected.

YARN: 

Our manufacturer uses only first quality, spun nylon rug yarn in the production of our braided rugs.  Nylon is unquestionably the best yarn for this purpose.  It is unmatched for its durability, stability, color fastness, fade resistance and ease of cleaning.  The yarn, itself, comes from a single source supplier which provides greater consistency in color from dye lot to dye lot.  As stated, there are no fillers or blended yarns used.

THREAD:

The thread used is a #52 monofilament thread for stitching braided rugs together. Monofilament is preferred over cotton thread because cotton, being a natural fiber, will break down quicker and is extremely prone to dry rot.  Two colors of monofilament are used; Natural (clear) is used with light colored yarns and Smoke (dark) is used with the darker color yarns.

BASIC PRODUCTION:

To produce our old world charm custom, made to order, braided rug with modern technique involves two essential processes.  The first process is to make the braid and the second is to sew the braid.

BRAIDING:

The manufacturer creates the true flat braid using a piece of equipment called a "5-Carrier Rug Braider" (pictured at right).

 

Step one is to wind yarn onto a rug bobbin. The weight of the yarn dictates how many strands of yarn can be wound onto a bobbin. The yarn, as purchased from the yarn vendor, arrives as a cone of yarn, in single strand form.  A bobbin, when wound, may hold as many as 10 strands of yarn (below).  Once wound, the bobbin is placed on one of the five carriers of the rug braider.

 

Placed in operation, the braider rotates in a "Figure-8" fashion, creating a braid exactly like that made by hand 200 years ago in traditional braided rugs.  The “5-Carrier Rug Braider” is used by our braided rug manufacturer as it allows up to five colors in any strand of braid, allowing for greater choice of braid color and combination of color for the consumer.

Once again, it is important to know that the only braid produced for production of our braided rugs is a true flat braid. 

SEWING:

Once the braid of sufficient quantity has been produced as required by the size of the custom ordered rug, the braid us sewn together to product the intended shape, pattern design, color and finished size.  The rugs are sewn using an industrial zig-zag sewing machine and a #52 monofilament thread for reasons discussed. The machines are set up for a 12mm stitch width which is the widest commonly recognized in the industry. The wider stitch provides added advantages in strength and significantly reduces chances for operator error of missing a section of braid as it is being sewn together.

The machines are also set to 4 1/2 stitches per inch (stitch length). This also represents the greatest stitch length commonly known and further improves the strength of the finished product.

FINISHING:

Our braided rug manufacturer takes great pride in the finishing technique of each braided rug by using a unique three pass technique. The three pass method improves the overall strength of the finish, eliminates unraveling and produces a finish that is of equally terrific quality on both sides of the rug.

While the stitch length and width and finishing method employed slows down the production of each custom braided rug, it is further evidence of our exclusive manufacturer’s commitment to quality as being the # 1 priority.