THE JOURNAL
MAKING HISTORY
From English treasure-houses and French chateaux to landmark buildings turned into luxurious hotels, the Design Centre’s showrooms keep heritage skills
alive, reinventing the past to align with contemporary lifestyles. By Emily Brooks
W
e’re going through a nostalgic phase in decorating. Maybe it’s a case of “what goes around, comes around”, or perhaps we like to anchor ourselves to the things we know when the world outside gets turbulent – but what’s been dubbed a “new
traditional” decorating style is the zeitgeist. But what of the “old traditional” – those grand country houses that carry a centuries-old legacy of creativity and skill, or the five-star hotels carved out from some of the finest historic architecture? When they need updating or refreshing, then their designers call upon the expertise of the showrooms at Design Centre, Chelsea Harbour to tread the line between rare skills, passed down through the years, and new qualities that meet modern expectations. The Design Centre’s brands work with heritage bodies that care for houses of
the highest order, from sumptuous trimmings by Wendy Cushing Passementerie (available from Jason d’Souza), used at Windsor Castle and Hampton Court Palace, to fabrics for Versailles from Edmond Petit (available from Turnell & Gigon) and Pierre Frey. “With passementerie, there is very little that has been written down. Skills were passed down through the generations,” says Cushing, “and with historical restoration it always has to be accurate, as far as I’m concerned. We have to look at archive samples, examine them closely, and because we know all the techniques, we are able to reproduce this type of work.” Cushing’s business is one of only six in the UK still producing passementerie, and the recent revival of trimmings in interiors is keeping her busy: “It’s all come round again, which is incredible. Two years ago you couldn’t sell bullion fringe. Now everyone wants it.” From Spencer House to Chatsworth, legendary decorator David Mlinaric has
a fair few treasure houses under his belt. He spoke about working on them as part of a tour-de-force talk about his long career as part of the Design Centre’s Conversations in Design series at Focus/23. Contrary to the idea that historic houses should be stuffed to the brim with decorative objects, his secret, he says, was to keep things more restrained. “I don’t like doing things that don’t need to be done,” he said. “And I don’t like having things that don’t have a purpose – although, beauty can be a purpose.” He also observed how the wild maximalism of the past few years seems to have settled down into something more nuanced: “There’s been a period of ‘anything goes’ recently but I am glad to say that you don’t see that so much any more.”
LEFT: The former Old War Office on London’s Whitehall, now a Raffles hotel and residences, includes several suites with historic significance. The Churchill Suite –
designed, like the rest of the hotel, by the late Thierry Despont – features Watts 1874’s ‘Zarzozi Bargello’ flamestitched chenille on sofas and chairs, with its ‘Versailles’ cut velvet on the walls
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