Every tretford carpet contains cashmere goat hair from Inner and Outer Mongolia. Since the company's founding 62 years ago, the natural fiber has contributed to strength and durability. In the baunetz interior|design interview, marketing manager Ingo Schraub talks about natural fine dust filters, cutting out stains and composting carpets.
by Judith Jenner, 05/21/2021
tretford's carpets are in offices such as Google's headquarters in Dublin or the federal administration building in Bern, but also in every third kindergarten in Germany. Part of the recipe for success of the healthy living floor covering is its unusual material.
The hair of Mongolian cashmere goats is processed in every carpet. Ingo Schraub, Head of Marketing and Sales at tretford, describes what makes this fiber special, what design options the carpets offer, and why even penetrating stains are no problem.
You produce your carpets with a high proportion of cashmere goat hair. What are the properties of this material?
Ingo Schraub: One advantage of this material is that it is particularly hard-wearing and durable. The goats live in Mongolia at temperatures ranging from minus 30 degrees in winter to plus 30 degrees in summer. In addition, this goat hair is longer than that of the German domestic goat. The Kashmir goat is the only one that has a top coat with a length of about 20 centimeters. The roof tile-like scale structure of the goat hair binds fine dust in the indoor air. Unlike smooth floors, where the fine dust is always stirred up, our carpets bind it and it can be easily vacuumed.
How exactly is the goat hair processed?
The animals are not sheared, but the hair is cut off by hand like at the hairdresser. Thus, the procedure is painless for the goats. For all carpets for residential use, we use a mixture of 80 percent goat hair and 20 percent virgin wool. For contract use, we use 70 percent cashmere goat hair and 30 percent polyamide, or nylon, to ensure chair roll suitability.
What to consider when caring for it?
You can get most stains out with carbonated water. It transports the dirt particles to the surface, which can then simply be dabbed off. If a stain doesn't want to disappear at all, there is always the option of cutting out the piece. You can use the cut-resistant material in the same form, the fibers will bind together and the cut edge will be invisible.
What effect do your carpets have in the room?
They have a sound-absorbing effect. This is also due in part to our ribbed design. What's important in rooms where people work with sensitive equipment is that our carpets don't build up static electricity. One of our projects was a center for the deaf in Würzburg, where the boarding school children wear hearing aids. There, such a carpet is indispensable because otherwise they would get an electric shock or the devices would break.
What applications do you see in public and private spaces?
Even though the products for residential and commercial spaces look visually similar, they definitely have different characteristics. In addition to the normal sheet, there are tiles and planks, as well as custom-made designer goods. Thanks to the cut resistance, we offer individual carpets in every conceivable shape. This is in great demand internationally, because there is no other carpet that you can cut and assemble from individual pieces in the same way as intarsia work. So faces can be created, company logos or patterns like flowers. Because of the modularity, the carpets can always be changed afterwards.
To what extent do tretford carpets support the desire for healthy living and sustainability?
The issue of sustainability is firmly anchored in tretford's DNA. It starts with the packaging made of grass paper. We try to do without foils as much as possible. With our Ever product, we also do not use moth protection and instead of the normal adhesive bed, we use an adhesive bed made of latex. Our carpets usually last 15 to 20 years, often longer. For this reason alone, they are sustainable. They contribute to a pleasant indoor climate through their hygroscopic properties. If there is too much humidity in the room, our carpet absorbs it and then gradually releases it back into the room.
Where do you get inspiration for new colors?
A lot comes from fashion and other interior areas. We then try to implement these colors with our carpets. Since we already have almost 70 colors in our range, it's basically about nuances.
Leibnitz-Institut Berlin: From the extensive color palette (40 colors) the choice fell on a warm orange.
What are your most popular products?
That depends on the area of application. In kindergartens it's the bright candy colors, in the office sector it's the brown and gray tones, and in the private sector, which is our main business, it's the beige tones.
What impact has the pandemic had on tretford's business?
Demand has increased once again because people are spending a lot of time at home. We are already working a three-shift system at our production site in Germany. Capacities can hardly be increased, so customers currently have to expect short waiting times.
With a company history of more than 60 years: What is the relationship between innovation and tradition in your company?
On the product itself, innovation takes place in new color blends. But a border collection - including a check pattern - has also just been relaunched. In the digital area, we have designed a configurator in which the customer can virtually lay carpets, tiles, planks or sheet goods with a photo of his room. By specifying the room dimensions, the required quantity is determined and the price displayed. We are also working on how we can make our products recyclable or even compostable in the future. However, this will certainly accompany us for the next two to three years. One idea could be that the carpet decomposes into its individual parts by adding boiling water, which can then be returned to the material cycle.
PHOTO © tretford carpet
© tretford carpet
tretford
tretford is a high quality carpet with natural materials for healthy living and working. For more than 50 years, the company Weseler Teppich GmbH & Co. KG has been producing the floor with cashmere goat hair, partly by hand, in Wesel on the Lower Rhine. The brand name tretford has now become synonymous with the owner-managed company and stands for a colorful, textile floor covering with a characteristic structure in high quality.
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