HISTORY:
Yayla Tribal Rugs was founded in 1980 by Chris Walter. Yayla, meaning “high summer pasture or mountain pasture” is a word from Turkish, but the word and concept is common to many of nomadic peoples of the Middle East and Central Asia. In the early years Yayla sourced its rugs mainly out of Turkey. In 1987 Chris took the modern vegetable dyeing revival , which had germinated in Turkey in t
he 1980’s and reintroduced it to the Turkmen people from northern Afghanistan who were living as refugees in Pakistan. Working with Turkmen and other refugee groups from Afghanistan, Yayla greatly diversified its rug lines, which led to its rapid growth in the 1990’s. In 1992 Yayla took its experience in vegetable dyeing to India and Nepal as well. NETWORK:
Yayla was a one person operation in 1980, and started out as mainly a wholesaler. Today we remain primarily a wholesaler, with over 100 accounts throughout the US and Canada and Europe.. We also have a retail presence, focused mainly in the Boston and New England area. OBJECTIVE:
Yayla’s objective has always been to create unique and beautiful rugs using all the traditonal materials that have been known and used for countless generations. The essence of traditional materials to Yayla means the use of hand carded and hand spun wool and vegetable dyes. These are the materials that were used in all hand woven rugs prior to the industrial revolution which brought in chemical dyes and machine spinning in the late 19th and 20th centuries.
