Mark Cullen

As a small child Mark passed some afternoons in the care of a woman who had a full sized loom in her home, she was weaving rugs and the afternoons spent with her were full of stories and colours. From that great cats cradle of cords and wood bright textiles emerged as if by a sort of magic. Many years later some local friends moving house found a bundle of assorted joinery that had been an old loom and Mark carted it home. It was his small daughter Madeline who noticed the engraved letters and numbers that helped them bring the loom back to life and he began to experiment.

Mark studied Textile Design at Bradford where he came across the work of the weaver Peter Collingwood who has been an important influence. His son Jason introduced him to “shaft switching” a loom modification that gives one the freedom to move coloured wefts between the two faces of a rug. Mark hand dyes a lot of his yarn using traditional methods and natural materials to obtain the more lively and complex colours that are such a joy to work with. He remembers as a child noticing the subtle complexity in the traditional tweeds from Eire and Scotland.

Mark’s rugs are hand woven on a linen warp with a wool weft and insertions of other yarns like silk sari waste to add accidental highlights. Some natural dyes produce colours that are less fast and so the rugs should be kept out of full sunlight. He works in a studio in Cornwall and loves to welcome visitors to watch the weaving and puzzling over designs that keeps him happy.