Ella Doran
Award Winning Designer
Who doesn’t adore Ella Doran? She has boundless energy and curiosity and a great eye for colour, nature and form. Her designs are innovative and inspiring, witty and fun; and we love collaborating with her.
We first worked with Ella when she curated her 'Sheep to Seat and Fleece to Floor' exhibition at The Yorkshire Sculpture Park in 2018. Alternative Flooring took yarn from the fleece of the sheep at The YSP, had it spun, dyed and made into a narrow width floor runner in an adapted version of Ella's iconic Waterlake design. The result was the start of a beautiful friendship.
"Interpreting Waterlake into a carpet runner has felt very natural. I was able to adapt the design to fit the format perfectly, and despite concerns as to whether we would be able to achieve the right blue in the dying process of the YSP wool, it has all been achieved."
Back in 2016/17, Ella was on a residency at Yorkshire Sculpture Park, commissioned to create a collection of designs to celebrate 40 years of ‘Art Without Walls’. This was when she first created the ‘Waterlake‘ design, inspired by the movement of the lake with its birdlife. During her stay, whilst photographing the Park’s trees, and the sheep grazing around the Henry Moores, she came up with the idea of working with the wool from the sheep and demonstrating a circular story of working with natural biodegradable materials from the land. Ella wanted it to involve following every step of the process that wool has to go through to become a woven textile or floor carpet. Nearly two years later, she achieved that with her 'Sheep to Seat and Fleece to Floor' exhibition at YSP.
"I find inspiration in the everyday. I love to travel, but it could simply be a local walk through the city that inspires a new collection. I see the world around me in shapes and patterns."
We loved Ella's Waterlake design so much that we decided to introduce it into our Quirky Collection of patterned woven axminster carpet runners, in the classic Blue colourway and also a Black version. Quirky Waterlake went on to be the winner of The Campaign for Wool’s British Wool Carpet Award, which highlights the best showcase of the natural features of British wool; a very proud moment for us.
In addition to Waterlake, Ella created her unique Camo design which was inspired by the bark patterns of Plane trees in her local park - we love how she continually celebrates nature!
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