The look of Nani Marquina (71) is still as fresh as the first day she started making contemporary rugs. And as much as with her eyes, she speaks with her hands, in which silver Indian bracelets jingling. A memory of the artisans who make designs come true that they then export to all corners of the world. The designer has been weaving knot by knot for more than 35 years a brand that flies among global brands and is synonymous with well-dressed floors. No one before her made modern rugs, they simply copied what she had always done.
Their showroom on Roselló Street (Barcelona), a garage converted into a contemporary souk, is a beautiful installation of skeins of wool, silk, cotton, cashmere, jute and carpets. There Nanimarquina celebrates its 35th anniversary among Indian aromas and flavors to pay tribute to the skilled artisans who shape his creations.
The Barcelona native has always been ahead of the game. Before Mariscal drew the Olympian, Cobi already commissioned a rug for his first collection, in 1987. It is still in the firm’s catalogue. Peret and América Sánchez were also his first star collaborators, at the time of the graphic design boom. In 1989, her Begonia collection was selected by the Museum of Modern Art in New York (MoMA) store. In 1993 he ventured to move manufacturing to India. “I had a large order from the Arts Hotel that was technically impossible to do in Spain because mechanical production greatly limited us in the design. Going to India was all or nothing, otherwise I would have had to close,” explains the creator and businesswoman. This decision differentiated them from the competition.
And to continue with a career marked by difficult but successful decisions, in 2014 he opened a headquarters in New York, which has now changed for a new store in the Flatiron District, a neighborhood full of design and vitality.
And when they have turned 35 years, a new milestone: obtaining the Climate Neutral certificate. Their goal is zero emissions and they have included in their catalog the circular Re-Rug collection, which uses leftover wool from carpet making.
Nani was clear that to prosper she had to do good design, but also think like a businesswoman, going beyond what her father, designer Rafael Marquina, did. She admits that at first “I just wanted to design and not have to worry about payments. At 30 years old I had a moment of lucidity and discovered that I liked to carry out a project that had been built little by little.” In 2005 she was the first woman to win the National Design Award, for her work as a businesswoman.
Now, his daughter, Maria Piera (1978), is a crucial part of the company, in her position as general director, and her sister Carlota, the artistic director, takes care of the catalogs and the corporate image. Nani can now dedicate herself to pure design, although she says that her daughter often stops her. Maria replies that “creativity and risk are in the company’s DNA, but the rugs have to sell.” Head and heart, a very well-matched tandem. Now it remains to be seen which of the five grandchildren (three, Maria’s children, and the other two from her partner’s daughter, the photographer Albert Font) will follow the creative path of their grandmother and great-grandfather.
