Vanessa Barragão: upcycling materials to help the natural world  

Portuguese craftswoman Vanessa Barragão transforms traditional craft techniques including crochet, latch-hook, embroidery, felting and rug tufting into unique textile objects. Her rugs, installations and tapestries are all made from upcycled deadstock wool, which she sources from factories she collaborates with in Porto. It was while finishing her fashion MA in Lisbon that she first began her tactile yarn pieces. Brought up and now based again on the south coast of Portugal in Albufeira, Barragão uses her work to draw attention to the destruction of the natural environment. Her vibrant textured work aims to recreate natural worlds, from coral reefs to the surface of the moon. Her eco-conscious processes and materials also highlight how modern creative invention and historic craftsmanship can live hand in hand.

What is your creative background?

My family is very crafty. My grandfather, my mother’s father, used to work a lot with wood. My father used to do woodwork as well, when he was younger. My grandmother did crochet, and when I was younger, I used to crochet a lot and I really enjoyed the process. I decided to go into fashion design; I went to Lisbon to study and then did a master's degree. However, I understood that fashion was not something I was comfortable working with; I didn’t want to spend my life in that environment. I decided to focus on fabrics instead. I like the artisanal side of it, the craft. For my final project I decided to do a wall hanging tapestry, and that was how it started. I used to put everything on Instagram. When I finished that tapestry, someone came to me and said, ‘I would like to buy your piece’. This was a big motivation for me to keep developing, so I decided to look for a place where I could create my tapestries more easily. I discovered the tufting technique, which now is very trendy. I decided to go to Porto to work in a textile factory, where I stayed for four years working as a textile designer. In 2020 I moved to the south again because I had a lot of commissions.

What do you like about representing nature and how did that develop?

My main inspiration comes from nature. I’ve always travelled to places where I can be surrounded by nature. When my sister and I were younger, we always wanted to travel to hot places like the Caribbean and Brazil. The first time we went and saw the coral reefs in Jamaica, I panicked. I love the corals and marine life, it’s one of the most amazing things I’ve ever seen. At the same time, it has a message: the degradation of the environment. The first piece I created was all white with a few parts in colour, to represent what’s happening.

Do you plan your colours and shapes or is it more intuitive?

Now, since there are six of us in the studio, I have to do a drawing for them to follow. But when I'm creating things myself I don't like to use a drawing and I prefer to choose just a few colours.

Are all the works tufted or do you use other techniques like crochet?

I do the latch-hook and crochet technique here in the studio. Then I have other untufted products that I do at the factory, and then here we carve. We don't have the structure or tufting guns. They ship things to me and I do the final processes here.

Where do you source your materials?

I realised at the factory how many discarded textiles they are producing. Now, I use all recycled, discarded materials. It's good for me and good for them. I think we have to change our perspective. We have to look for ways to put into practice what we have in our minds. It’s important that we go and see what we waste, and create ways to work with different materials. Recycling is very close to the message [of the work] around pollution and global warming.

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