The Landfill Heriz

Spring in New Hampshire arrived at about the same time that my partner, Jim Way, and I arrived from San Diego for our six-month annual stay. We faced a myriad of clean-up chores around the property, the result of a severe New England winter. Fallen branches, mounds of pine needles and oak leaves indicated the necessity for our first trip to the local landfill since we are not blessed with the luxury of municipal trash collection. After loading the Jeep with branches too small for firewood and ten large plastic trash bags, we set off.

Upon arrival at the landfill, we noticed that things had become more organized than they had been the previous fall; each type of debris now had a specific area of its own. In order to get to the organic, biodegradable area, we had to drive past a small mountain of rotting mattresses, hide-a-beds, rolls of shag carpeting, and strips of rubber underpadding.

Only half jokingly I suggested to Jim, "Look out for any Oriental rugs."

A split second, later he said, "I think I see one!"

I couldn't believe my eyes. Sure enough, there, lying forlornly in the center of this mass of cast-aways, was an apparently handmade, old, room-size carpet, neatly rolled up and tied, dealer-style, with four white ties. Jim went to unload the Jeep while I trudged into the pile to get a closer look at the "treasure." A few minutes later, he returned, and I announced in a stage whisper, "It's a Heriz!" It was a Heriz with some obvious rot problems, but a Heriz none-the-less. Now, the question was, how do we get it? In San Diego there are strict rules forbidding any sort of dump-picking, with warning signs prominently posted. No such signs here, but to be on the safe side, I

decided to approach the center of the landfill where a beat-up old pick-up sat with its occupant, a wizzened old codger, whose job seemed to be to make sure things were dumped in the proper area, a man of obvious power.

Greeting him in my most amiable manner, I asked, "What are the rules for dump-picking?" Before answering, he rummaged through his cluttered glove compartment and came up with a stained, wrinkled sheet of paper and began reading off a list of charges: "Costs ten bucks to dump a sofa or hide-a-bed, five bucks for a mattress or roll of carpeting, now a refrigerator is gonna cost...."

"No, no," I interrupted, "I don't want to dump anything. I want to take something."

"Well, what is it you want to take?" he asked suspiciously.

In the most casual tone I could muster I said, "Oh, it's just an old rug."

"Is it one of them expensive kinds?" Here we go, I thought.

"Oh, I don't think so. It may have been at one time, but it's all rotted now. I just would like to have it for pieces."

"Well, you go get it and bring it here and we'll have a look at it."

The rolled up rug was too heavy to carry alone in the unstable footing of the debris, so I got Jim and the two of us waded out and carried the carpet, still tightly rolled, up to the pickup truck.

On the way up we speculated that the old guy would probably say it's an antique and therefore worth a fortune and so charge us accordingly. He took one look and said, "Oh, that old thing! Take it if you want it!" Not a word about money.

We threw it in the back of the Jeep and took off.

We arrived home full of anticipation as to what this, as yet, unrolled beauty would reveal. That it had rot problems on one end was obvious, but what lay inside? In very short order, the entire rug was exposed to the light for the first time in God knows how long.

Good news and bad news! The rug was indeed a Heriz, and it did have rot problems, lots of rot problems. Running down the center of the rug was a column of large rotted holes, some as wide as two feet! We theorized that the rug had probably been stored for several years where water was either dripping, or it had been partially standing in water while rolled. With the exception of three small rotted areas on one side edge, the rest of the rug was not only sound but showing only very slight wear. What the hell, we thought, it was free.

We prepared the "patient" for immediate surgery. With mat knife in hand, we performed a radical "centerectomy." A three-foot-wide swath was cut down the center from warp fringe to warp fringe. This eliminated at once most of the cancerous rot. Next, three small "selvagectomies" were performed in the same ruthless manner. As luck would have it, one end of the cut-away, three-foot-wide swatch was still sound. Voila! Our border section for patching the sides! Our patient was now carried up to the deck for a much-needed washing. While it dried, now in one small and two large fragments, we decided on the next procedures. The patient could certainly be sutured together, but neither of us were inclined to try to sew through a thick Heriz the length of a twelve foot seam, plus three, six to eight inch square patches. No, there had to be a simpler way.

We hurried to the local furniture store whose carpet layers had, just the previous summer, installed some (heaven forbid) wall-to-wall carpeting in our home. We remembered that the installers used a roll of tape to join large sections of carpet. Was it available and could we buy some? Yes to both questions, and home we went with two five-dollar rolls of the stickiest, reinforcing tape imaginable.

When the two large fragments were thoroughly dry, we continued the operation. In order to get a tight fit with no gaps, we turned them face down on the deck and tacked one section with small nails.

The second section was then positioned cut edge to meet the cut edge of the first section. Pushing and pulling to prevent gaps and then nailing the second section to the deck, we were finally ready to apply the tape.

A single strip of the nearly four-inch-wide tape down the entire length of the rug was enough to do the trick. Now, with the pile side up, we used a small leather mallet to hammer down the new seam to insure that the tape would grip the fibers on the back. It worked like a charm. Next, came the side patches, done in the same tape-and-hammer method. Matching the pattern exactly in the border pieces had to be sacrificed as we had salvaged only the one section of border pattern. Finally, the edges of the set-in side pieces had to be falsely overcast to look like there was a selvage; actually the warps were going in the wrong direction.

Operation complete. Patient doing beautifully, if a bit strange-looking to the discerning eye. Prognosis: years of pleasure-giving life. We call it our Landfill Heriz. Ray Rosenberg is a collector, restorer, and co-founder of the Rug Society of San Diego.