LIVE24SEVEN // Property & Interiors
Fire up your imaginations !!! THE LAUNCH OF THE NEW SPRING COLLECTIONS
John Biddell has owned and run John Charles Interiors, based in Edgbaston, for more than 30 years, his wealth of knowledge and experience in Interior design and soft furnishings will add depth to our property and interiors section and give you, the reader, invaluable help with the process of decorating your home.
Yes, it’s that time of year again that we designers all look forward to – the launch of the new spring collections of fabrics and papers. A couple of weeks ago off we all trotted to London Design Week, to be regaled with many and varied offerings of the weird and wonderful (well, wonderful mostly) from the showrooms in and around the Chelsea Harbour Design Centre.
I’ll be happily bombarding you with all my favourites over the next few months, but this month I’d like to talk about the new collections from Osborne & Little, and their stable mate Lorca. Interestingly enough, they are one of the few major design houses not to have caved in to the pressure to open a showroom within the ever expanding Design Centre. Both they and Designers Guild have stuck resolutely to their lovely showrooms on the Kings Road.
So what delights have they come up with this season?Well, there are a
whopping great 10 new collections on offer, several of which tickle my particular fancy a treat !!! I absolutely love all things Art Deco, and its related themes.
The flagship collection, comprising two books – one fabric and one paper - is entitled Fantasque, and consists of a collection of abstract and geometric curtain fabrics, which pay tribute to the artistic and cultural movements of the early 20th century, teamed up with rich and stunning papers incorporating metallic tones of bronze, silver, antique gold, copper and gilver, presented alongside terracotta, turquoise, yellow, ultramarine, sapphire and steel blue.
Apparently, La Boutique Fantasque (also known as the Magic Toyshop) was the name of a ballet conceived by Massine in 1919 for the Ballets Russes, to piano music by Rossini. As I said, the colours are stunning enough, but the designs . . . oh my goodness !!! My out and out favourite is a show-stopper
which is actually called Fantasque. Available as a cotton print and the most fabulous metallic toned paper, a sleek panther stalks amongst extravagant Art Deco foliage. This is closely followed by another cotton print and metallic paper combination entitled Chrysler. Here, stylised Art Deco leaves are reminiscent of the spire on the Chrysler Building, a magnificent feature of the New York skyline since 1930.
Mind you, the Fantasque collection doesn’t limit itself to Art Deco. There’s a striking design called Cubiste, which is also available in both fabric and paper, in which rectangular blocks of varying size and colour are painted on the diagonal, in hommage to the Avant Garde art movement led by Picasso and Braque. Amongst other splendid fabrics and papers, there’s a truly lovely paper called Lempicka, in which broken circles depicted in fine lines form a broad stripe.
Under the heading “Not a lot of people know that”, Tamara de Lempicka, the Polish painter influenced by Cubism, was the first female artist to become a glamour star. She found her fame by painting portraits of the somewhat
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