Sunbrella Area Rugs Debut from Colonial Mills

By Staff -- Home Textiles Today, 9/1/2008 12:00:00 AM

Pawtucket, R.I. —

Braided texture rug and home accessories manufacturer cmi (Colonial Mills, Inc.) has partnered with Glen Raven Custom Fabrics LLC to co-create a new rug collection that is made entirely of recycled Sunbrella-branded fiber.

Trademarked and titled "renaissance," this domestically made indoor/outdoor rectangular rug grouping employs a new recycled Sunbrella yarn from Glen Raven's Renaissance Recycling program. These rugs represent the only soft floor covering on the marketplace today made of 100% Sunbrella fiber, featuring inherent fade and stain resistance.

The renaissance collection is manufactured in a flat-braid construction, which makes for a durable and reversible rug.

The new Sunbrella yarns used for renaissance were developed for the braided-rug construction from Glen Raven's Renaissance Recycling program and feature 50% recycled content from manufacturing and downstream waste. The other 50% of the content comprises virgin Sunbrella fiber.

The resulting effect, the company said, is "a rug with the look and feel of rich wool and the performance and ease of care expected in a Sunbrella product."

The collection comes in six patterns — banded diamond, Harwood stripe, Chatham stripe, surged border, outer border and solid — and 12 yarn colorways including mink, mushroom, garnet, pumpkin, granite, ebony, basil, feldspar, cornflower, papyrus, wheat and alpaca. It is available in eight accent and area rugs sizes as well as octagons, squares and runners.

"We expect this new collection will allow us to supply a tremendously successful accessory to specialty retailers, catalogs and furniture manufacturers," said Donald Scarlata, cmi's president and ceo.

To help promote renaissance, cmi is introducing a new, smaller "Sample Center" option that displays one to six rug sample books, versus 32. "It will be ideal for dealers who want to feature just their indoor-outdoor rugs, for example," he explained.