RyŌan-ji – Black and White Wool Rug/Wallhanging
by Lyk Carpet Germany

For the past 15 years, industrial designer Mareike Lienau has been intensively researching the question, "What makes craftsmanship contemporary?" with her label Lyk Carpet. In doing so, she continuously strives to make traditional materials and techniques tangible and to enter into direct dialog with people. Her holistic approach fosters intercultural connections between humans, materials and traditions. This approach stretches beyond craftsmanship — as a process designer, Mareike Lienau reinterprets wool in space to provide food for thought and spotlight the history of traditional techniques. The objects she creates result from craftsmanship while assuming full responsibility for their creation process. By linking design and production in this way, she purposefully engages with the history and significance of traditional craftsmanship. Furthermore, Mareike Lienau actively integrates a variety of players, including craftswomen and sometimes even clients, in her work. This close collaboration allows her to combine their experience and expertise, resulting in innovative solutions that transcend traditional ways of thinking. This collaborative approach not only lays the foundation for her creative work, but also demonstrates how the engagement of different players helps to break new ground in the design and interpretation of contemporary art. Mareike Lienau designs unique textile objects and bespoke décor pieces. She uses unexpected and unusual materials and techniques to shine a spotlight on craft. Her work fuses an avant-garde design approach with traditional craftsmanship. All Lienau’s textiles are certified by Label STEP and handmade by a small-scale artisan manufacturing partner in Nepal using socially and environmentally responsible materials and production processes. The resulting pieces are intended to engage a new generation of art and design lovers, encouraging them to think about global responsibilities and socio-ecological factors. Furthermore, Lienau’s work celebrates time-honored textile craftsmanship and the inherent beauty of natural wool and dyeing processes. With every design piece — whether presented on the floor, suspended from the ceiling, or placed somewhere in between — Lienau explores the impacts of structure, texture, and color in space. Lienau is an industrial design graduate who studied product and process design at Berlin University of the Arts (UDK). The question ‘What is contemporary about craft?’ is fundamental to her design process. She elaborates, “My vision, passion and values influence my design process.” Many objects emerge from this unique triad. All her designs are knotted by an artisan Tibetan manufacturing partner in Nepal from hand-spun and vegetable-dyed highland virgin wool. “I want my objects to bring people joy — to add value, to encourage them to think about their consumption patterns and to reflect on the ripple effects of their choices. I have a deep sense of respect both for the earth which provides me with natural materials and the people who craft my objects. The stories behind them connect us all.”