On Weaving Door Mats

As a mariner, I've great appreciation for practical use of rope.

A small digression:

"Rope" when onboard, is known as "line." I'll use both terms throughout this essay but, you should know the difference. In the end, they are the same thing, but if you said "rope" onboard, don't be surprised if you get silently labelled as a landlubber, and possibly corrected.

There are two types of linework. The kind where the knots are completely practical, and fancy work, which is also usually very practical, but also worked into making it look pretty.

Some folk like fancy work, and others despise it.

As for me, I'm a fan. But, as I'm a working artist practicing my favorite craft of creating useful art pieces. So this should not be a surprising.

On my last stint onboard, I decided to weave up two door mats for the art studio. I had time. Six weeks is plenty of time to make two mats. I hadn't made anything out of line in a  long time, but I figured that if I had a good reference photo, I could make it happen.

In most Alaskan coastal towns, there usually is a marine hardware store. These down to earth stores carry everything a person needs to fix most things on most vessels. I love walking through them, impulse buying as well as getting everything on my list.

I had a few hours off one day and took the opportunity to buy 150 ft of line (50 ft 1/4" braided for the inner loop and 100 ft of 3/8" braided for the outer loop) a curved sewing needle, some kite string, and some super glue.

I knew from past experience  that it takes a lot of line, and even more patience to work up a handsome mat.

I also knew that the first night of working would be the hardest. I had to weave the basic form of the knot to at least two laps, which allowed for the knot to be moved without falling apart in the transit. I only had about an hour a day to work on the mats, so I had to make it count.

I began. It pretty much went as i remembered. Making the basic form is tedious. I looked at a complete mat I saw online, and tried to follow the form, snaking my line over under over and under again and again. Slowly, it began to take shape.

I stopped for the night after 2 laps. From there on, it was pretty much following the form until the laps wove up tightly together.

At this point, i had to tighten up the knot. So, I chose one line and began working it all the way through to the bitter end. Then I did it again with the next lap until all had tightened up nicely.

The last hard part was transitioning the 1/4" line to 3/8" of the outer weave. I hollowed out a section of the 3/8" line and pulled the casing over the 1/4" line. Once encased, I sewed the two together and put a basic whipping over the top.

From there on, i just had two wrap loops around the inner knot and hold them in place with tape while I glued and sewed everything together with the kite string. More tedious work.

The end result is two very useful and very handsome mats. I put one in the van and one in the studio next to the side door.

The first photos show the first mat. On the second, I wove a more complicated knot, and that's shown after. The recipe is the same.

I mailed them home and when they arrived, I chose their final resting place by where they looked best. The blue in the van, the pink in the studio.