Nika YoNika was born from one woman's obsession with experimenting with materials, working with her hands, and discovering new forms, textures, touches, and patterns. My name is Nikoleta, or Nika, a visual artist with years of experience as a set and costume designer. Crafting objects and installations from different materials is where I feel most myself. I learned how to weave on a loom as a teenager when I used to spend hours on end enchanted by this practice. A magic spell that has never lost its power. Later came theater and set design, which, on the other hand, taught me how to see spaces as an infinite stage for visual transformation and rearrangement.
As tufting grew in popularity and I deepened my practice, a nagging thought kept bothering my mind. Is there a way to enrich the relatively quick and easy crafting method with something truly original? Could I find my own expression beyond just another beautifully tufted carpet? Something that is not only a new form or pattern. What if I apply the portability approach of building theatre sets to something that is considered a fixed element of the interior design, like the floor coverings? And that's how the idea of modular textiles was born. To create carpets and other home accessories that can be easily assembled, transformed, replaced, rearranged and renewed.
I shut myself away in the studio and started visualising and sketching the building blocks of a modular carpet. I searched for an attachment system that is easy to use and aesthetic at the same time. I wanted patterns that can be mixed and matched in various combinations. And a color palette that appeals to many, yet is not the omnipresent black-white-gray-beige modern minimal style.
After months of trials, errors and fine-tuning the concept, the puzzle was solved. And, just as intended, the solutions were many. An original Nika YoNika design that is hand-built from the first sketch to the last stitch. Every patch can live on its own and combine with the others in multiple ways. A floor covering that can be as big as you want, infinitely rearranged, quickly replaced, and easily renewed. What once covered the floor can be fixed on the wall, moved to another room and used in a way even I haven't thought about.
Welcome to my world of modular textiles, where you and I create together unique home furnishings with patience, for pleasure.