The Manhattan Tartan for the 21st Century design combines the color of threads into a medium-tone grey, a summation of the spectrum of color—an all-inclusive representation of neighborhoods. The North-South subway lines in Manhattan represent the diversity of household incomes by assigning them geographical and financial designations, forming a more harmonious Manhattan Tartan for the 21st century.

“We are interested in how textiles convey meaning. One of the most conceptually complex semiotic systems in the world is that of tartans, which reflect kinship relations, regional distinctions, and myth construction enmeshed in a sophisticated expression of colonial resistance.”

“We feel that a new design of The Manhattan Tartan Project is essential for the 21st Century. All previous discrepancies in Tartans' language, design, and histories are now collapsed into one by combining the concepts of the two distinctive Manhattan Tartans of the 20th century.”

“A paradox of tartans is that they are colorful, festive signifiers of divisions... As artists living in New York, we were constantly aware of all the ways we group ourselves so that we can stay with our own kind and be wary of all others. We wanted to explore how our separateness from each other is made manifest in how we live, in where we live, and in who we live with.’ — J. Morgan Puett and Suzanne Bocanegra

Inspired by Manhattan’s urban grid system, the artists designed these two different tartans. Using publicly available demographic and Wall Street economic data, the thread counts of these tartans also map New York’s ethnically diverse population of approximately 1.6 million. Despite being one of the world’s wealthiest and most powerful cities, one in four New Yorkers lived in poverty, the majority from minority ethnic backgrounds, at the time these tartans were designed. They draw attention to the structural inequity and racism present in New York, often known as ‘redlining,’ when financial services and products such as mortgages are denied to residents living in certain postcodes. The silver threads in the Manhattan Financial tartan correlate to white privilege. Although made before Occupy Wall Street in 2011 and the current cost of living crisis, this work highlights inequalities requiring urgent debate and action.