Wild Thing in red emerald by Lewis & Wood

The fabric sample above is a detail of Wild Thing in red emerald, a linen fabric by Lewis & Wood that I have been admiring for months. Last autumn they sent me a stack of textile samples and this particular piece was the first thing that caught my attention. I had seen the fabric in its entirety - 'a bold large print pattern featuring foliage, flowers and wildlife' - on their website and cannot say it particularly interested me, perhaps because there seemed to be too much going on; it was too wild for me. When I turned it over to view the information on the back I honestly thought the sample had been wrongly labelled. When my mind finally began registering that this was in fact the Wild Thing fabric I realised how important it is to focus on the details of fabrics before judging.

The motifs of the fabric are flowers, leaves, birds and a monkey. What makes the fabric so interesting to me is the way the dyes are unrestricted. There are outlines but the dyes are both inside and outside the lines, which makes the design even wilder and more vibrant.

Wild Thing in red emerald and ginger kiwi by Lewis & Wood

The Wild Thing fabric is available in three colourways: copper cobalt, ginger kiwi, and the aforementioned red emerald. I think the copper cobalt fabric (below) is ideal for those who perhaps want to play it a little safer but for me the red emerald is the winner. I can easily picture it as my future bedroom curtains.

Wild Thing in copper cobalt by Lewis & Wood

Lewis & Wood: The English Ethnic collection

In my last blog post I included samples from Lewis & Wood, an English textile and wallpaper company, and said I would share more later. They had sent me a stack of both fabric and wallpaper samples, some that had already attracted my attention online. The surprise were patterns they included in the package that hadn't caught my attention on their website but looked so incredibly beautiful when I was able to see the design details with my own eyes and feel the texture. I plan to share a few patterns later but today, with my latte, I'm focusing on the Womad and Bacchus patterns from their English Ethnic collection that arrived on the market last year. The collection, designed by artists Su Daybell, Flora Roberts and Melissa White, has been well received and featured in various magazines.

At Lewis & Wood they refer to Su Daybell as their wild card. She is the artist who created the arresting Womad pattern that has abstract flowers and motifs. The 100% linen fabric is available in two colours, burnish and celestial. To say that I have a major crush on the burnish one, in my top photo, would be an understatement. I honestly cannot stop admiring it. The colour palette of the Womad wallpaper consists of three beautiful hues of blue, brown and yellow, called stream, silt and sand.

In the foreground: Womad wallpaper samples in (from left) silt, sand and stream

For the collection, Daybell also designed the Force 9 pattern, suited for anyone unafraid of bold design. For those interested, a styling in the September 2014 issue of House & Garden shows it in a colour called gravel.

Bacchus wallpaper and fabric in mead by artist Melissa White

The Bacchus pattern by artist Melissa White for the English Ethnic collection is certainly on the market to stay. In the August 2015 issue of The World of Interiors its bluish colour - grigio - was selected in a round up of the best bold large-scale patterns on the market. The BBC Antiques Roadshow Magazine selected the pattern, in mead, as their winner of 'Best Printed Fabric 2014'. In their July 2014 issue they featured White at work in her studio where you can view her original artwork for the Bacchus design.

In a brochure from Lewis & Wood, introducing the collection and its designers, it says that Melissa White is well known for her Elizabethan wall paintings and painted cloths, that her "scholarly fascination with surface decoration and historical detail" give her designs a "real authority". The Bacchus pattern, 100% linen fabric and wallpaper, is available in three colours, mead, malt (greyish) and grigio. Not shown in this blog post is her other design for the collection, the Rococo wallpaper.

Decorative muralist Flora Roberts was the third artist chosen to design for the English Ethnic collection. You can view her stunning patterns Doves and Sika on the Lewis & Wood website.

In the left corner, a detail of the Bacchus fabric in grigio by artist Melissa White

Lewis & Wood was founded in 1993 by textile printer Stephen Lewis and interior designer Joanna Wood. In the beginning the operation was in a London basement but in 2008 the company moved to a large building in Woodchester Mill, in the Stroud Valleys in Gloucestershire. If you happen to be in London their showroom is on the first floor of the Design Centre East at Chelsea Harbour.

Charleston: A Bloomsbury House & Garden

This summer my collection of coffee table books grew larger when on my birthday I got a copy of Charleston: A Bloomsbury House and Garden by Quentin Bell and his daughter Virginia Nicholson. Quentin was the son of artist Vanessa Bell (author Virginia Woolf's sister) and her husband Clive. The book tells the story of the Charleston House in Sussex, which Vanessa took on rent during World War I - by then her marriage to Clive was in name only. Her sons lived with her, as did artist Duncan Grant and his friend David Garnett, who were lovers. Actually, many years later David married her and Duncan's daughter, Angelica, who was born in the house. That is not the subject of this blog post but let's just say that relationships often got a little complicated, or shall we say interesting, within the Bloomsbury group, as the circle of friends was called (see also my recent post on BBC's Life in Squares). The book about Charleston is enjoyable and the decorative details are a constant source of inspiration. This is a bohemian style with a wonderfully personal and artistic twist.

Vanessa Bell's bedroom, p. 58

The way the book is set up each room gets a chapter that tells its story, how it was used in the beginning and later decorated. Quentin was 85 years old when he started writing the book. He had finished the first draft when his health deteriorated. When he was unable to write his daughter, Virginia, who also knew the house well, sat with him and listened to his stories of the house and recorded them on tape. He died in 1996 and she finished the book. The chapters are divided into sections marked with their initials, so the reader always knows who's telling the story. Alen MacWeeney photographed each room for the book and every photo has a caption explaining the details. There are also old black and white photos of the inhabitants and their friends, but the house was a popular holiday home for the Bloomsbury circle.

Vanessa's bedroom, seen above, used to be the larder but in 1939 it was converted and a tiny window was replaced with a French window that opens onto the garden. I have never visited Charleston but this corner has become my favourite. Her beautiful desk is a 19th-century French fall-front secretaire. She designed the curtain fabric for the Omega Workshops in 1913. The curtains in the photo are a reproduction of the original fabric by Laura Ashley in 1986.

Duncan's sitting room in the studio, p. 67

Vanessa later negotiated a long lease on Charleston, which meant that she and Duncan were able to construct a proper studio. It was ready in 1925 with plenty of space to paint and there was room for a sitter or model. Roger Fry, a member of the Bloomsbury group and the founder of the Omega Workshops, helped with the construction. Part of the space became Duncan's sitting room. Duncan decorated the screen behind the chair and the panels around the fireplace in the 1930s. Later, in 1939, Vanessa turned a room on the second floor into a studio of her own.

The window in Duncan's bedroom, p. 109

Quentin writes that he has slept in all the rooms in Charleston but Duncan's bedroom remains his favourite room, having 'the most complete decorative scheme of any in the house' (p. 108). Vanessa painted the decorations in the window embrasure and she also designed the cover of the antique French window seat.

In Clive Bell's study, p. 47

The above photo shows Clive Bell's study, which used to be a living room. Clive had been a frequent visitor at Charleston but in 1939 he moved in. Vanessa painted the window embrasure in 1916-17. Duncan decorated the tiles set into the tabletop in the 1920s or 1930s.

Until I am able to visit the Charleston House (see their website for opening hours) I will enjoy its rooms and decorative objects in my book. My only regret is not having the hardcover edition because I know that this book will become more precious than others on my coffee table.

A constant source of inspiration, indeed.

Zarafshan linen fabric in rust/slate by Lewis & Wood

A final note: All the textile samples I used in the styling are from Lewis & Wood. The fabric, inspired by the Eastern Suzani tradition, is Zarafshan, made from 100% linen. It is available in various colours, three shown here: In the first two images Indigo/Cranberry, the third Turquoise/Lime, and in the last two Rust/Slate. More on Lewis & Wood later.