Rugs are central to grounding a room. It sets the scene for furniture, art, and plants to be displayed. And at London Design Festival 2026, rugs are having a moment. Sitting at the intersection of art and textiles, rugs are getting the recognition they deserve, blending both functionality and beauty. Here are six designs that we have enjoyed seeing at the festival and beyond this week.
Christopher Farr
Christopher Farr’s archival rug designs are presented alongside contemporary furniture from Max Radford Gallery. The exhibition titled ‘Progressive Permanence’ was presented during London Design Festival to act as a canvas that merges art, crafts and design. We personally love the interior dialogue created through an amalgamation of eras and geographic influences.
‘All the rugs have been chosen because we love them as individual textiles, but also love how they sit with the works from our roster of designers,’ Radford previously told Wallpaper*. ‘It also enables us to put our designers on a platform with respected names of the 20th century, which is new for all of us. I think presenting these contemporary works alongside such heavy hitters reinforces our belief that the designers we work with can go on to become the respected names of the 21st century.’
Marc Phillips
Marc Phillips Mira rug
American rug designer Marc Phillips presents three new pieces at London Design Festival 2026. The collection was designed around the idea of restraint. There are two hand-knotted Moroccan designs and a handwoven flatweave, and although the construction and origins differ, they are united by a similar colour palette of warm tones. ‘Orah’ is handwoven in wool, with irregular striped bands in brown with tan and rust accents that shift subtly in tone across the width of the rug. ‘Ziri’ is softer with a chevron pattern in brown wool, and ‘Mira’ is the boldest with its diamond and leaf motif in rust, tan, olive, and dusty purple colours. The collection feels soft and grounding, a perfect anchor for any living space.
Floor Story
Rug by Les Keepers
During London Design Festival, Floor Story always seems to have a playful, collaborative project to showcase, and this year is no exception. The London rug designer presents five rugs in an exhibition hosted with Spanish furniture maker Sancal and curated by interior designers Trifle*. The five rugs, which were staged in rooms with Sancal furniture, were designed by Coco Lom, Les Keepers, Lakwena, POoR Collective and House of Quinn.
Jogakbo, designed by Les Keepers (above), is a rug that focuses on the beauty of inconsistencies, capturing this through delicate linework and patchworking. The patterns feel like a wild garden with intersecting lines and patterns that overlap and go against linear designs. POoR Collective’s design celebrates London housing estates and translates tower-block architecture into a joyful and optimistic flatwoven pattern. Read more about their design here
Collina Strada for Layered
Swedish design house Layered has collaborated with New York-based fashion label Collina Strada on a new rug collaboration. The result is a collection that is vibrant and dynamic, perfect for a subtle statement. There are four hand-tufted rugs and two sofas in a flurry of pink and green tones. What we enjoy about the designs is the direct references to the fashion label’s history. One pattern references the floor of Collina Strada's New York flagship store, while another features the distinct plaid from the brand's AW26 runway.
The final playful touch to the collection is the flower-shaped structural rugs in different colourways, marking a departure from geometric patterns found in contemporary rugs. ‘In design, I'm interested in creating tension between opposing ideas: beauty and discomfort, fragility and strength, fantasy and realism,’ says Hillary Taymour, founder and creative director of Collina Strada. ‘I think fashion and design should evoke emotion and individuality rather than perfection.’
Nordic Knots
Matches rug
Nordic Knots's new collection, ‘Dancing Flower and Matches’, is rooted in Swedish Grace, an early 20th-century Swedish design movement that celebrated simplicity and proportion. The collection was shot at Stockholm’s Bio Skandia, a 1923 cinema designed by architect Gunnar Asplund, and the setting truly captures the rugs’ organic, yet graphic expression. There are two new rugs: 'Dancing Flower' leans towards floral motifs and comes in a warm sand or dusty blue colour. Matches is more graphic, honouring more rhythmic Art Deco geometric patterns with accents of golden bamboo silk.
Creative Matters
Over in Paris, RDAI and Creative Matters present Zoometry, a collection of six fine rugs, which replicate the microscopic workings of birds. Maison & Objet, local practice RDAI, led by Denis Montel and Julia Capp, teamed with Canadian rug manufacturer Creative Matters on the rugs. ‘The idea was not to design a carpet with a bird on it,’ RDAI interior architect Johan Thuillot previously told Wallpaper*. He looked at the microscopic patterns of birds and flattened them to create a pattern which could be rendered. The result, which is seemingly geometric yet contrastingly biophilic, was worked into Tibetan wool and Chinese silk, in a series of natural-looking colours from bright coral to deep brown. The collection is now on display at Galerie Mouvements Modernes.