An imaginative exploration into nature’s hidden side, the Wild Dyer carpet tile collection celebrates the unexpected richness and beauty of dyes from the often-overlooked mushroom. Two coordinating 24" x 24" styles pay homage to mushroom growth patterns, creating dynamic depths of movement within a beautifully constructed palette.
“Mushrooms nourish, heal and inspire us with diverse shapes and forms,” explained Jackie Dettmar, vice president of marketing, design, and product development at Mohawk Group.
“They teach us how nature works – interconnecting and regenerating all types of matter into new sources of life.” Under the weight of post-pandemic shifts affecting everything from the climate crisis to human rights and beyond, new “worlds” have emerged that offer a hopeful path forward for people, place and planet.
The Wild Dyer Collection ties directly into the notion of the Grown World – part of Mohawk Group’s 2023 theme: Emergent. The Grown World focuses specifically on eco- intelligence, the importance of the biosphere, and the role of fungi. “Fungi provide a dense communication system known as the ‘wood wide web’ – an interconnected network of fungi, roots, soil and bacteria that exists in forests,” added Dettmar.
“The relationship between trees, plants and fungi gave rise to the biosphere that supports life on land; and we rely on it all for survival.” Inspired by groupings of mushrooms very close to one another, Wild Dyer style Curious Cluster layers organic striations with a boucle texture. Named for mushrooms that grow with a bit more separation between them, Wandering Troop provides an all-over pattern in boucle with pools of color.
“In exploring a variety of mushroom species, our design team steeped specimens to extract their pigments,” said Mark Page, vice president of design for Mohawk Group.
“They were awestruck by the range of colors that emerged. The team interpreted the experience into a collection that brings nature’s principles into spaces while protecting natural resources.” Colorways start with four rich neutrals achieved by Mohawk Group’s dematerialized Heathered Hues yarn; when combined with the innovative Color Pulse yarns, four additional colorways are created that brighten the design spectrum. With the Color Pulse system, the designers were able to make patterns from the textures and emerging colors they discovered in mushrooms.
The Wild Dyer carpet tile collection blends technology and natural inspiration in a unique fusion, with patterns and colorways that suit a variety of contract interior styles. Wild Dyer features Mohawk Group’s leading worry-free technologies: Duracolor® Tricor premium solution-dyed nylon and EcoFlex™ ONE backing with attached carpet pad.
This combination of material innovation delivers unsurpassed stain resistance, colorfastness, durability, color clarity, and enhanced soil performance in the fiber, as well as better acoustics and ease of installation. Wild Dyer is designed to meet the highest standards of sustainability as a low embodied carbon soft flooring system.
Like all of Mohawk Group’s nylon carpet tiles, Wild Dyer is responsibly made using beyond carbon neutral manufacturing processes that provide a net-positive impact in both carbon and water. Additionally, each square yard of EcoFlex ONE backing contains the equivalent of 28 recycled PET plastic bottles.
In addition to supporting environmental sustainability imperatives, Mohawk Group remains committed to uplifting different communities of people as well. To explore the inspiration behind Wild Dyer, the company commissioned a work from Laria Saunders, an artist on the Artlifting platform who creates digital photo assemblage paintings.
Having suffered debilitating pain for more than two decades, Saunders is recently able to start managing her pain through natural medicines. As she shares in discussing the work, titled Ciclo de Las Setas,
“My main inspiration is the healing effects that plants and fungi have had on my health.” As part of the Better Together initiative, each time a product is specified from Mohawk Group collections that are part of its Artlifting partnership, a donation is made to Susan G. Komen through the Specify for a Cure program
