A new collection that treats rugs as visual compositions
Sam Baron and Tai Ping expand their 2022 experimental project into a ten-piece collection of hand-tufted rugs rooted in botanical motifs — on show during Milan Design Week 2026.
There are designers who treat the rug as a floor covering, and there are those who treat it as a canvas. Sam Baron has always belonged to the second category — and the Floræ Folium Series by Tai Ping, presented at Milan Design Week 2026, is the clearest demonstration yet of what that conviction looks like when given space to fully unfold.
For the French designer — whose work consistently moves between art and design, questioning the utility of everyday objects while elevating their presence — the textile surface has long been a preferred ground for floral figuration.
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Fifteen years of creative dialogue with Hong Kong-founded carpet manufacturer Tai Ping have shaped a body of work that takes this intuition seriously. The latest chapter of that partnership is now visible from 20 April at Tai Ping’s Milan showroom in Piazza San Simpliciano.
The collection builds on Floræ Folium, a 2022 experimental trio of rugs that explored the optical effect of anamorphosis using more than a hundred colours — a project that debuted at that year’s Fuorisalone before travelling the world. Where that project was a concentrated experiment, the Series is its full expansion: ten pieces, multiple formats (square, rectangular, circular), each carrying a delicate Latin name paired with a colour. Floras Natural, Corolla Vivid, Florum Vivid, Ramosa Vivid, Stamen Cirrus, Verdura Jade, Petalis Natural, Petalis Cirrus, Floras Jade, Folium Jade — names that read like entries in a botanical lexicon.
Petals, pistils, and leaves, expertly shaded, unfold across the textile surfaces through varied graphic schemes: central motifs, diagonal compositions, borders, and full-field patterns multiply the expressive possibilities of the floral theme. The decorations don’t merely reproduce their subjects — they reinterpret them visually through layering and grouping, elevating perception both up close and at a distance, in what the brand describes as an almost cinematic visual game.
Technically, the collection introduces something new. The rugs are executed using the classic hand-finished tufting technique, to which — for the first time in this body of work — stitching has been applied to select parts of the design. The result, as Juliana Polastri, Tai Ping’s Design Director, explains, is distinguished by perceptual clarity: relief effects, soft colour gradations and stitched details combine to make these rugs sophisticated handmade objects that remain, at the same time, accessible.
For Sam Baron, a designer acutely sensitive to colour, the process of translating his preparatory watercolours into woven form has been the central challenge and achievement of the collection. The selection across hundreds of colours, the calibration of tones, and the refinement of gradients — all handled through Tai Ping‘s technical expertise — are what make each piece singular.
The presentation itself is worth noting. Rather than staging the rugs in a conventional showroom display, Baron has conceived the Piazza San Simpliciano space as an artist’s studio: sketches, preparatory drawings, and watercolours line the walls, laying bare the genesis of each floral motif and the material decisions behind it. The rugs hang like paintings. It’s a deliberate act of transparency — an invitation to share in the intimacy of the creative process rather than simply encounter its polished result.
For a brand with over six decades of craftsmanship behind it, and a designer whose work has passed through the Centre Pompidou, the Cooper-Hewitt, and the Triennale di Milano, the Floræ Folium Series is a logical and considered evolution. Not a departure, but a deepening — proof that the most compelling design conversations are the ones that unfold slowly, over years, without rushing toward a conclusion.
From April 20, the collection will be on view at Tai Ping’s Milan showroom (Piazza S. Simpliciano), with an installation designed by Sam Baron himself.
