JOHN ALLEN, a Fellow of the Royal College of Art and consultant to the Victoria & Albert Museum is an internationally known textile designer, consultant designer, and writer on design and textiles.

Our exhibition will feature carpets inspired by the Australian and Nepalese culture and landscape. The work here is John's creative response to many years of travel - trekking and exploring old cultural sites. John finds the mixture of religious cultures & architectural styles in Nepal fascinating and visually stimulating. Alien elements are often introduced into traditional themes in his designs and, used together, produce exciting and interesting, sometimes disturbing, visual effects.

The carpets are designed and 'graphed' by John and woven under his direction in Nepal - all by hand - no machinery is used. Introducing new techniques, John's carpets are woven in different length piles and have flat woven areas against knotted areas to enhance the textural surfaces. John uses 'cut sculpting', usually only used to finish a carpet, as a decorative device. The vibrant colour combinations in the carpets are inspired by Aboriginal paintings and landscapes, the seasons, the weather and colourful sights he has seen, for example, the Imperial cities in Nepal where the streets are used to dry the red chilli harvest - resembling fabulous carpets themselves.

The carpets that we are showing in the exhibition are truly beautiful contemporary works.