Ceadogán Rugmakers

Luxury Irish rugs handmade in County Wexford, where traditional hand-tufting craftsmanship meets contemporary art, design and natural materials.

Ceadogán Rugmakers is a second-generation family business based at Barrystown near Wellingtonbridge in County Wexford. The story began in 1981, when Tom Ceadogain established a bespoke hearth-rug business in Wexford town. What started with a traditional craft has evolved into one of Ireland’s most distinctive contemporary textile studios, creating handmade rugs and textile pieces that sit comfortably between functional design and collectible art.

Every Ceadogán rug is made by hand in the company’s Wexford workshops. The process is deliberately labour intensive: hours of tufting, shearing, carving, clipping, backwinding and finishing go into each piece. The studio works with high-quality natural yarns including wool, silk, hemp and bamboo, chosen not only for their appearance but for durability, softness and the way they respond to the hand-tufting process.

Design collaboration is at the heart of Ceadogán. Over the years the workshop has worked with respected Irish figures across art, fashion, architecture and graphic design, translating original creative ideas into richly textured rugs. Current designer collections include work associated with Helen Steele, Andrew Ludick, Claire-Anne O’Brien, Deirdre Breen, Helen Cody, James Earley, Jenny Maslen, Katie Hession, Maree Hensey, Martina Navratilova, Patricia Murphy, Shane O’Driscoll and Zoe Choy-O’Byrne.

One of the studio’s most culturally significant projects is its Mainie Jellett collection. Jellett, one of the defining figures of Irish modernism, created rug designs in the late 1920s and 1930s. With permission from the Jellett estate, Ceadogán has translated her original gouache drawings into limited-edition hand-tufted rugs made in Wexford, preserving an important strand of Irish design history while making it relevant to contemporary interiors.

Ceadogán also offers an extensive bespoke service. Rugs can be scaled to suit a room and many designs can be customised in shape and colour, while fully commissioned pieces allow interior designers, architects and private clients to work directly with the workshop. This ability to combine a client’s requirements with the knowledge of experienced craftspeople is one of the reasons Ceadogán’s work appears in high-end residential and commercial interiors in Ireland and internationally.

The business has increasingly explored how luxury craft can sit alongside environmental responsibility. Its Neadaithe collection grew from a regenerative project at the Wexford studios involving alpacas, biodiversity measures and traceable homegrown fibres. The collection uses natural, undyed yarns including alpaca and heritage Galway sheep fleece, alongside Irish linen and reclaimed or repurposed materials, showing how traditional textile making can evolve without losing its integrity.

Visitors can call to the Wexford workshop during weekday opening hours, while weekends and bank holidays are available by appointment. The online shop also makes the collections accessible further afield, with ready-to-order rugs, limited editions and accessories including Wexford linen cushions alongside the bespoke offering.

Why W.ie chose Ceadogán Rugmakers: Ceadogán represents Irish craft at an exceptional level. The rugs are genuinely made in County Wexford, the skills involved are visible in every finished piece, and the business has successfully connected traditional hand-making with some of Ireland’s strongest contemporary designers and artists. It is also a family company with more than four decades of history, an international outlook and a serious commitment to material quality and sustainability. For W.ie, Ceadogán is exactly the kind of business that deserves wider discovery: unmistakably Irish, highly skilled, design-led and capable of turning a practical object into something that can be lived with as a work of art.