Designer Sandra Figuerola is one of GAN’s most fruitful collaborators. Her tremendously curious, restless and energetic vision has led her to design seven collections of rugs and kilims for GAN, all of them full of color.
Sandra Figuerola has the gift of capturing life forms from around the world and translating them into pieces that embellish any space. Her language, often geometric and inherited from artistic vanguards, exists outside trends. «I am a baroque with forms, expressive of the use and abuse of color, and I love mixing it up».
«My style is closely related to my vital experiences: nature, travel and art, all of them intimately linked to my way of life. These references give me culture, symbols and languages to work with» explains the designer. The starting point of Sandra Figuerola’s designs often coincides with a trip or visit to an exhibition that brings new inspiration or modifies the way she sees the world. «I try to stimulate the senses and nourish the eye with new experiences».
This process of experiential creation of which Figuerola speaks can be seen in designs such as Catania, Palermo and Siracusa – all of them directly influenced by a trip to Sicily, or in her Alexandra and Tumbuctú rugs from Glaoui collection, inspired by Moroccan ancestral handicrafts.
If Sandra Figuerola’s designs for GAN have something in common, it is color as a protagonist. «I love working with a wide color palette. All ranges are interesting to me as long as they are well coordinated. Everything depends on the style or the graphic idea that you have. Sometimes intense ranges and contrasting tones work. Some other times, on the contrary, it is better to use tones in the same chromatic range and flee from saturation ».
The multiplicity of styles by Sandra Figuerola can be seen in collections such as Catania, in intense reds, black and white; in Glaoui, which combines different techniques such as manual looms, knotting and embroidery, creating richness in textures; and in the Siracusa kilim, which is inspired by Mediterranean-style patterns, often present in tiles and old friezes.
In Sandra Figuerola’s designs for GAN, the geometric languages inherited from artistic currents and the elements that derive directly from nature are always intertwined. Form is always at the beginning of the creative process for the Valencian designer. «My way of working prioritizes the pattern, the color, the form. The material, as support that needs a design, is something GAN knows very well. Their qualities are always the best: the tinting, the wool, the threads, the natural fibers, the finishes … ».
In fact, the collaboration of Sandra Figuerola and GAN has given way to collections of unique designs made using complex handmade techniques, always with 100% virgin wool.
Sandra Figuerola and GAN share their perception of the importance of the rug as a functional and decorative element. “It is an element that delimits space, brings color, warmth or a point of audacity and madness to a room”. Sandra Figuerola explains the relevance of carpets and rugs throughout history: «In painting and art, they can be seen integrated into urban landscapes, into rooms of Renaissance interiors, opulent and baroque, but they are also found in contemporary references such as in the works of Balthus». Sandra Figuerola’s designs turn pieces of the world into textile stories close to works of art: “A rug is a blank canvas… And I love to paint on it”.
