We recently featured a few ideas on how to decorate your walls on a budget. If you’re looking for more inexpensive ways to brighten up your home, The New York Times recently challenged five interior designers to renovate and refresh the rooms of recently unemployed people on a budget of just $300. Click here to check it out!
Windows are symbolic of many things. For the poetic bunch, they emote hope and a one way ticket to the soul. For the voyeuristic crowd, each window reveals a hidden story emerging at sunset. In recent months, window patterns have been popping up throughout textile and home categories. UK designer James Nash conveys this through his t-shirt graphic entitled House, where type and structure become one. Illustrating a curious overview of an apartment building at dusk, fellow Brit, Peter Jensen brilliantly merges upscale fashion with the banalities of daily life.
Geoff McFetridge is a true design pioneer, not to mention a wicked multi-tasker. “He is part of a new generation of designers who are eager to leap the old divides between image and product, design and art, the flat page and the moving image,” says Paul Thompson, director of the Smithsonian’s Cooper-Hewitt, National Design Museum. Patten Pulp caught up with McFetridge to talk about his design process, as well as Pottok, the wallpaper company that he founded with his wife Sarah. Pottock marries McFetridge’s unique pattern skills with environmentally-friendly papers and water-based inks. The abstract and breathtaking results have papered walls from The Montalban Theater in Hollywood to the well-known Colette boutique in Paris. Check out our Q+A for a glimpse into the mind of this skateboarding wunderkind.
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PP: What websites do you generally start your day with-do you have a daily routine for news/blog/information consumption?
GM: I listen to npr for news. Friday Saturday Sunday we get the New York Times. If there is a site I check in the morning it is probably Cycling News, then Velonews. I take in a lot of useless cycling information.
PP: How did you discover your talent and how has it evolved over your career?
GM: I liked to draw as a kid. I liked to draw more than almost anything. It was not important if I was talented, I drew so much that I was bound to get good. I still improve. I look at work I did a few years ago and notice how much better my new work is.
PP: Do you discuss your work with other designers? If so, how does that impact your creation process?
GM: I am not very connected with other designers. I have an assistant who I bounce most things off of. He is a designer, and has different but similar tastes to me, so that helps. When I need to pull out the big guns I show things to my wife, Sarah. She runs Pottok and has a cold eye for quality.
PP: Where do you usually work on your patterns and what is your preferred method of creation + execution?
GM: Everything starts as handwork. All work I do starts as sketches and notes to myself in large coil notebooks. I then start to draw out some actual forms on loose paper. A lot of the designs defined by how they are made. Almost every pattern I do I approch differently. One is made out of paint that I dripped on a board and then turned into a forest. A few are based on intricate drawings. The repeat for these was worked out with abstract shapes on the computer, I then drew the complex drawing over the repeating design so that it would repeat properly. A lot of the most popular designs are very graphic. Those designs are drawn entirely on the computer. This is a process of drawing, tracing, and printing out in order to get things right. The final step of the process is either hand cutting film or getting the film output.
PP: When is the last time you took a professional/creative risk?
GM: I think that most days I take a little risk. Every project I accept I consider a risk. I am such a small studio (me and an assistant) that I have to chose projects and shows wisely. I do not have a lot of time to waste.
Creatively? I feel like I challenge myself by constantly adapting and developing my style. I rarely go for what I know works well. That is a type of risk, not exactly a risk, but maybe not totally playing it safe.
PP: Do you incorporate commercial trends into your work and if so, is this a factor that drives your design?
GM: No. My work is generally based on other work I have done, its an evolving process.
When times are tough, retail environments pull out all the stops, forcing their design teams to get crafty in lieu of spending big bucks. Sometimes these ad hock compilations are miserable collages and other times, wondrously creative ideas emerge. Anthropologie’s artistic displays typically fall into the later of the two categories. Inspired by Parisian wallpaper styles, the back wall of the retailer’s Fifth Avenue location pairs kitchen wares with floral chalk panels. Using a $10 can of blackboard paint and a steady hand, Anthro’s budget illustrations are incredibly chic and can easily be translated to any wall in your home.
Inspiration: Floral Striping
When designing floral striping, all inspirational elements must be considered. Here is a mood board that combines paralleling themes through the use of nature, Parisian craftsmanship and modern techinique.
Spring has sprung in Manhattan and that means stroller season has once again returned. As I enjoyed a leisurely Saturday afternoon of people watching and casual reading in Hudson Park, I watched gaggles of moms pass by- each with a luxury stroller darker than the next. I found it odd that no one had decorated their hood, a prime canvas for art. At that very moment, Åsa Rodgers and her beautifully accessorized stroller walked by. Pattern Pulp was lucky enough to catch up with her for a brief chat. “As a new mom I quickly found that the stroller and diaper bag were to become my main accessories, and in my case I was not ready to give in to the dull and practical products I saw in the stores,” said Rodgers. Using her design background, Rodgers quickly solved her own dilemma by launching Åsa of Stockhom Baby Collection from her Tribeca studio.
Over the past year sales quickly increased as mothers began approaching Rodgers on the street and resultantly became walking advertising for her. “I wanted something unique and beautiful that reflected my own personal style. My inspiration came from great fabric designers who incorporated impeccable quality with playful patterns that I knew my son would love!” In addition to dressing up strollers, Rodgers’ collection now includes matching diaper bags, nursing bibs, baby aprons and booties.
Most of us are too impatient to let ideas evolve overtime without overwatering them. Christie Wright of Brooklyn, NY, embraces the idea of storytelling as a strategy for designing. “Building by Leaving,” one of her latest creative endeavours, embraces the idea of growth through location and experience. Sewing rungs together from various fabric swatches, her ladder grows over time, accumulating new colors, shapes, and patterns. In an effort to understand growth, escapism and personal history, Wright’s creation is reminicient of a modern day Rapunzel.