The designs for Wendell’s carpets are taken from a group of small paintings he had worked on spontaneously before he was approached to participate in Woven Forms. While he considers himself a craftsperson rather than an artist, painting is a medium that has fascinated him since early on in his career when he realized that he was working mainly in wood and really wanted to add some color to his practice. This desire for more colorful work eventually resulted in his fiberglass pieces, but it began with painting on furniture as well as two dimensional paintings on canvas. Throughout his career he has continued creating two dimensional paintings from time to time as he feels inspired, but has typically not found applications for them beyond fulfilling a personal interest in painting. This Woven Forms project presented him with a perfect opportunity to translate his paintings into functional design pieces.