Moona Saul is a carpet artist who also creates tattoos and a tattoo artist who also creates carpets! In this story, she talks about her two creative outlets and the sharp objects involved. Follow Moona's Instagram for a daily color fix.
By the time I was 13 years old, I knew with all my heart that I was going to be a fashion designer. I started my own blog where I shared my handmade clothes and accessories, and I was part of an after-school sewing class. I also participated in many high school fashion design contests and always wanted to make things I didn't know how to make, figuring it out along the way.
I did follow my 13-year-old self’s dreams and went on to study fashion design in Denmark and the Netherlands. As the years went by, I felt more and more that the fashion world wasn’t for me, but I really enjoyed the experiments we were doing with textiles and how mixing different materials could create a whole new landscape. I also enjoyed drawing patterns, so I started creating illustrations with lots of mixing and matching of patterns that I developed myself, playing with the idea of maybe moving on to print design.
Tattoos came first, but only because the space where I was living at the time dictated it. Tufting carpets takes up a lot of space and makes quite a mess. As soon as I got the opportunity, I started building my tufting frames, though the idea had been in my mind for a few years already.
I was living in Amsterdam when I started learning tattooing. My first tattoo was done on one of my best friends, and it was my drawing of a Greek statue placed on a chair with a glass of red wine spilled in front of it. It was very intentional and organized since she really wanted to support me in my studies. For almost a year, I gave tattoos to friends and friends of friends for free —letting them know exactly my skill level of course. It was crazy of them to go along when I think about it now! Without their 'just go with it' attitude towards tattoos, I couldn’t have started this journey.
My tattoo and carpet styles differ a lot from each other. With carpets, it’s always pretty crazy and unpredictable since that’s the design language I’ve created. People come to me to create something different and out of the box.
With tattoos, up until recently, black ink works were definitely dominant, but lately, people have been looking for more colorful designs, which is cool! The colors vary a lot from person to person, and that’s how it should be—everyone following their own heart. The common motifs are pets, plants, and those that tell a (magical) story that can be interpreted in many ways.
I am kind of a weird tattoo artist - I don’t have tattoos myself!
When the COVID crisis hit, everyone was crafting at home and sharing it on social media, which, for me, led to a lot of videos on tufting. Since I’m the type of person who believes I can teach myself anything practical and just experiment to find my own unique approach, I became obsessed with the idea of one day creating my own textiles this way. It took about a year and a half of failing, experimenting, and finding my own way to do it - and it’s an endless journey of discovery and perfecting my technique!
Tufting involves inserting yarn into a woven backing material and using a tufting gun to create loops or cut piles. It requires craftsmanship but, compared to weaving, is less labor-intensive and a bit faster. If well-maintained, tufted carpets are a good option for those seeking a balance between quality and affordability. Like handwoven carpets, each tufted carpet is unique, much like a painting, since human hands, not robots, make it.
I typically use a special backing fabric made of polyester, and my favorite yarn is this Lithuanian wool, which has an amazing selection of colors. Sometimes, if a design calls for it or a customer prefers it, I mix in other yarns as well. A mid-sized carpet, let’s say around 100x160 cm, takes about two and a half to three weeks to make if I work on it Monday through Friday, it can vary a lot depending on how detailed a carpet is. I work a maximum of 4-5 hours a day on a carpet, as it is physically very repetitive.
With carpet design, it mostly starts with the colors I want to put together. These days, I usually sketch digitally, as it lets me experiment with combinations and shapes more quickly. First, I let my hand sketch shapes that come naturally, then it’s a lot of collaging, and finally, I fine-tune the details. Often, when I design, I come up with many more good designs than just one, and I keep them all. This way, I can go back to my inspiration bank and develop new designs from there.
Each of my works is unique, as I do not repeat a design twice and constantly challenge myself to learn something new. The most recent challenging carpet I finished was one where the pattern was formed by people’s answers to a certain question. I was determined to shave the colorful parts that pop out of the white background in a way that creates a difference in height, resulting in an embossed surface. Perfecting the details of this one took a crazy amount of hours that I wasn’t prepared for, but the result is extra special. It will be auctioned soon!
Most of the accidents with needles in my life have been with sewing needles. But there are a couple of other cases as well. Once, while tattooing, the needle pierced my glove during a session. And once, I technically ended up with a "tattoo" while I was still learning: I had attached the fake skin to my leg to make it less flat and more realistic. The needle poked through in a few places, and now there are some small black dots on my leg.
With tattooing, I think it’s crucial to find a mentor and take things patiently; this is kind of the formal education path in tattooing anyway, and I really support that. During the first six months, I mostly observed my mentor and focused on perfecting the hygiene aspects; it is a very important part, as people are trusting their health into your hands! Recently, there have been many short tattoo courses offered and advertised as the formal good route. But I think it's irresponsible to tell people you can start working fully as a tattoo artist after just two weeks of training - craftsmanship takes some time and definitely can’t be approached like a get-rich-quick scheme.
With tufting, there isn’t much formal education beyond workshops and YouTube videos. Attending a workshop definitely helps to enhance your knowledge significantly in just a few hours. In this case, I think what’s most important is having patience through the first failures and not giving up. I do believe that my formal education in fashion design helped me teach myself tufting, as the two are somewhat connected. In art, I think the most important things are discipline and persistence because there’s no single clear path to follow. My biggest supporters during my creative journey have been and still are a few very close people in my life. I’ve subconsciously curated a good balance of die-hard cheerleaders who love whatever I create and honest critics - each of them plays a very important role.
