Last May I met Martyn Lawrence Bullard at the Boston Design Center, where he was promoting his new fabric line for Schumacher (I blogged about it here.) In addition to another fabric collection for Schumacher, he has a new tile collection for Ann Sacks. Swatches from both collections, below.
Martyn Lawrence Bullard’snew tile collectionfor Ann Sacks
“Mousharabia” inspired by carved wood latticework screens of Morocco
“Eastern Promise” concrete tiles
“Hermitage” mirrored glass tiles
– – – – – – –
Martyn Lawrence Bullard’s latest collection for F. Schumacher & Co.
This is the first post of a new column for StyleCarrot, called Swatching. As you can probably guess, I’ll be highlighting textile, wallpaper, tile, rug, and other similar collections of products used to decorate. I don’t get over to the Boston Design Center as often as I’d like, so maybe this will motivate me. Of course I also get press releases and images directly from the companies and designers as well.
On Monday night I had dinner at Trade, chef Jody Adam’s restaurant on the Waterfront, with the lovely ladies of Manhattan-based interior design firm Tilton Fenwick. (Thank you Duralee for hosting!) I first met Suysel DePedro Cunningham and Anne Maxwell Foster in the spring of 2012, through Traditional Home when the designers we nominated won a spot in magazines digital TRADHome issue. (I wrote about Palmer Weiss; have a peek here.) I’ve followed their work and stayed in touch.
Earlier this year, Suysel and Anne, who are known for mixing a giddy array of color and pattern, launched their first fabric line, Tilton Fenwick Collection for Duralee. Here is a sampling of their fantastic prints. Now, I need to go see what I can re-cover . . .
Miraval
Marvin
Whittaker
Barlow
Jax
Cecilia
Cline
Berk
Soskin
Rocat
Quintessence
The designers behind Tilton Fenwick Suysel DePedro Cunningham + Anne Maxwell Foster
Yasumasa Morimura “Dialogue with Myself 1,” 2001 on Timorous Beasties, “Glasgow Toile ” printed linen, 2004.
Last fall, the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston opened the new Linde Family Wing for Contemporary Art. We went with the kids, in a fit of “let’s get them some culture.”
Turns out one of them had a serious fever by the time we got home. But anyway . . .
I was thrilled to turn a corner to see an entire wall sheathed in Timorous Beasties’ “Glasgow Toile.” I knew that the Scottish designers, Alistair McAuley and Paul Simmons, were talented guys, but I hadn’t realized they had reached such sophisticated levels of recognition. Turns out, their work is also at the V&A in London and the Cooper Hewitt in New York.
Detail
I have been meaning to look into how the “Glasgow Toile” fit into the larger exhibition as a whole, as well as the relationship between it and the Yasumasa Morimura painting that hangs on it.
(Yasumasa Morimura, by the way, is a Japanese painter who borrows images from historical artists, ranging from Edouard Manet to Rembrandt to Cindy Sherman, and inserts his own face and body into them. I just read the article in New York Magazine about an African American superstar artist working in Japan who has a similar schtick, but I shan’t digress any further.)
Although many of the works in the gallery have been moved around since my visit, including the Morimura, the fabric is still there, and will be through the fall. What’s on it today? Interestingly enough, Cindy Sherman’s Untitled #282, in which she portrays herself as Medusa.
My own simulation: The Cindy Sherman photo that hangs on the wall of “Glasgow Toile” at the MFA.
This morning, I talked wtih Edward Saywell, Chair Linde Family Wing, Head of Department of Contemporary Art & MFA Programs. He was charming and informative, with an appealing British accent. Although he doesn’t know the TB designers personally, he went to college in Scotland at the time they first set up shop in 1990, and has always been a great fan.
He told me that the theme of the gallery is “Quote Copy Update,” so all of the works in the space are about artists reacting to or emulating prior works of art, sometimes breaking traditions. Some look to the past to create something fresh with new technologies. Saywell says, “The Timorous Beasties ‘Glasgow Toile’ fits beautifully in that context. They looked at the old toiles of pre-Revolutionary France, and effectively created a toile for the 21st century.”
Like Morimura’s work, which is based on Frida Kahlo’s self-portraits, Sherman also looks back into history for inspiration. Saywell points out what now seems obvious: Sherman’s work looks back to the Old Masters. Making it even more fun, he told me that it was photographed for Harper’s Bazaar. He says, “She looks like a sexy centerfold, but has cast herself as Medusa.”
Seywell explains that they wanted to show the Timorous Beasties fabric as something that belongs in the museum in its own right, but they also wanted to get across the idea that since it is commercially available , one is likely to have something hanging on it in a domestic setting. He says, “We could have just displayed the roll of it. . . but we wanted to underline the drama and the excitement of the fabric by covering the entire wall.”
Why am I blogging about this today? One, Timorous Beasties has been on my brain. I just ordered a few samples of their papers—“Butterflies” and “Thistle”—for a design project I’m working on.
Top: Butterflies | Bottom: Thistle and Thistle detail
Two, I was asked to write a blog post about a London store I’d like to visit as part of the launch of the new Shopikon Londonsite and app. Shopikon is a very well-done shopping guide (I know, having written a number over the years myself!), with summaries and photos of the best stores in Barcelona, London, New York, and Vienna (Paris and Berlin to follow).
Obviously, Timorous Beasties is my top choice of London shop. As if I don’t want to get my eyes on this stuff already, Shopikon further lures me in with: “Part showroom and part art gallery, you could spend hours gazing through the collection.” Yes, please.
London-based design blogger (maybe we’ll meet!) Katie Treggiden of Confessions of a Design Geek sent me these images of Timorous Beasties “Thistles” concrete tiles that she spotted at Clerkenwell Design Week. They would be fantastic in a powder room, or in a kitchen with gray-grouted subway tile, installed behind a stainless steel range. These would be especially satisfying to experience IRL (in real life).
And for the New Yorker’s out there, the zany zebra wallpaper by Scalamandre in Masai Red made famous by Gino’s, which is also fun (and a little less jarring) in Zanzibar Gold, $91.25/roll at Decorators Best.