The Art of Rug Customization
Have you ever wondered about the process of rug customization? We interviewed Komoro Ogbokor. He is known for his handmade, trendy, and creative custom rugs. He’s recently customized a rug for rapper Young Thug. In this guide he shares people that influence his art, the challenges he’s encountered while customizing rugs and what he’s learned about the customization process.
IG: @Kokomorugs
What inspired you to start customizing rugs?
It was random; it was like peak quarantine time. Since High school, I played around with graphic design, nothing really serious, but just messing around with it. So, I made a design, and I was like, oh, it would be cool seeing it as a rug. Then I was looking online, and searching around looking for manufacturers, stuff like that. I found a manufacturer and now that I look back, the price wasn't bad for what they make. But then I was like, oh, I can make this myself, Let me see if I can. So, I was just searching around trying to figure out how to do it and that's kind of how it started.
When you started out was it hard?
Yeah, it took me a really long time. I started around the time when it was just kind of starting to get a little bit of buzz. So it's like, you can't really find information on it, but you could at the same time. You kind of have to take a deeper dive to really figure out how to do it. So, at first, I started with a punch needle. Before I had the whole gun and everything as you can see in my videos. But it was super hard to start it up, honestly.
How has black culture influenced your art?
I will say it hasn't had the strongest influence on my art. I've only made one piece for myself. Since the beginning of Kokomo Rugs. But the one thing I did make was an Astro Boy for myself because Astro has always been one of my favorite characters since I was young. He's always had fair skin. So I'm like, I want to make it but let me just make it black, you know, for me.
How long does the customization process take?
It really varies because if I'm really into making something I don't want to make it super quick. And like the designs for me, it's pretty simple. Because there's not really any detailed stuff on it. So it varies around that.
What did you discover about customizing rugs that you probably didn't know in the beginning?
For people I didn't know anyone, even now I really don't really know anyone in Vancouver. Honestly, I see more people in Toronto doing it but there may be people here, but I just personally haven't seen it. Something I've learned over time with rugs, I guess, is that the more time you put into it, the better it will become. In the beginning, to get straight lines and everything I didn't really know the formula and how much time you need to trim the edges and all that stuff. So, I kind of just make it and then say to myself, Oh, this is good enough. Now I really found that when you take your time And actually, snip the edges and the extra stuff they'll come out a lot better.
Can you customize any object?
Yeah, you can make basically anything, honestly. Like, there's only some things that I haven’t been too good at doing like, I haven't done any faces, but it's something I really want to do and then things like gradients, blending colors, it can get kind of tough, but majority times just color blocking.
Who inspires your art?
Tyler the Creator and Slawn who is a Nigerian UK artist he makes random pieces of art. Sometimes they can be really not PG to say, but he does his own thing and he doesn't really care what other people think. But at the end of the day, it's still his art and it just inspires me to just keep pushing. If you like what you make then other people will actually mess with it.
Has art helped you in any areas of your life?
For sure the business aspect has really made me more focused, I would say, because, before this, I was kind of just going to school and work. And eventually I just got kind of burnt out, and didn’t want to do anything. But now, I have stuff that I need to do and priorities. Making rugs just makes me more focused and more driven towards a goal. It's really helped me in the areas of goal setting and things I want to achieve.
Advice you have for people that are starting their own business?
I would say, just keep going even though you might not get the amount of attention that you want as long as you keep going, you will eventually get that sign and what you want honestly. It just takes time.