Timorous Beasties

I was just listening to an interview on By Design about the wallpaper and fabric designers called "Timorous Beasties". You can download the interview here. I looked them up and had to share their designs with you all. Absolutely beautiful illustrations. But I also like the way that they create new variations on old themes. In particular the toiles, see the London Toile below, which eschews the usual chinoiserie buildings and shepherds and shepherdesses and instead includes shady characters and modern architecture from the streets of London. Apparently they have a Sydney Toile planned. As you stare at them more and more details emerge, which is what I think wallpaper is all about after all. Something to gaze at first for the rhythmn of a the repeated pattern and the richness of colour, and then as you look for longer small details and even a type of narrative begin to emerge.

The designers are featured in an exhibit at the Melbourne Exhibition centre for the State of Design Festival. More information here.

It will be a long time before I have my own place to wallpaper willy nilly but in the meantime I can wallpaper my blog instead. All images come via the Timorous Beasties website.

London Toile

Napoleon (though as a keen scholar of Baroque Rome this says Barberini to me!)

Devil (I love the idea of having this on the wall and as you stare at it the Devil emerges, maybe not for a bedroom though...)

Branch Out

Bloody Hell