These beautiful pieces are from Galatea, a textile design studio based out of Madrid. I fell in love with the textures on their tumblr page and was even more intrigued by how they created these complex pieces!
The Galatea design duo, Marta Bahillo & Brunella Giannangeli, call these pieces “hot textiles” and explain them here:
“The textile experiments are done using recycled materials, such as knitted pieces torn out of old clothing, or made specifically for the textile piece by hand or machine knitted. We also use plastic shopping bags, thread, or even used tea bags. These are all put together and blended with the use of heat: an oven, heat gun, special iron or even putting them in the microwave for a couple of seconds (although this can be a bit dangerous), it all works! It all depends on the effect you want to get, the texture or colour you need, the pattern you are aiming for… – it is worth trying it all though, sometimes mistakes make the best pieces… or the best disasters. Ultimately though, it’s all about experimenting in whichever way you’d like.
They recommend a book by Kim Thittichai, called Hot Textiles, which gives insight into these techniques.
1. What inspires you?
Everything around us inspires us – we are lucky enough to live right in the city centre of Madrid, a very busy city! We stroll to exhibitions all the time. For example, last Saturday, we saw this brilliant Yinka Shonibare exhibition, wow… very inspiring. Also our walks in the park, people on the streets, textures on the walls… we love the city life and if we need nature we do Galatea trips to the mountains. It gives us the air we need!
2. What other hobbies/interests do you have that help your work?
We love messing with any paint, we love experimenting with knitting, crocheting, and any textile form; and more than cooking: we love eating! and any chance of a coffee break around Madrid… yes, with a croissant.
3. You mentioned that you attend Indigo. Do you sell your prints there? Where can people purchase your work?
We meet our customers from different parts of the world at Indigo. It is a good meeting point and we love the fair for checking out new prints and to feel the buzz of the industry. We haven´t sold our prints directly at Indigo yet, but people can purchase our work by contacting us directly, easy!
A big thanks to Galatea! Keep up the good work!
