If you attended the Showtime upholstery textiles market this month, you may have noticed a slight uptick in the number of paisleys. Interest in these motifs is picking up again as they shake off their traditional image and shift toward transitional personalities that could make them more appealing in the future.
What features transform a paisley form traditional to transitional? A streamlined character is essential. New paisleys from makers like Dicey have cleaner shapes and fewer floral ornaments, allowing them to fit in a broader range of situations.
Golding says color is also key. The range of pinks selected for their newest paisley design made it pop. Home Accent Fabrics agrees that color makes a difference. Their unexpected use of turquoise, teamed with a watercolor technique, helped distance this company’s pattern from the menswear looks that have defined many paisleys in the past.
Covington calls out texture as an important way to bring paisleys up-to-date. That’s because texture is trending in a big way. This is true for all materials, not just for fabric.
In addition to watercolor effects (watercolor is still a factor for 2017 product development), streaks and wood-block textures can be used to suggest age, or simply to make textiles more interesting. In woven fabrics, unique weave structures that give paisleys a dimensional look offer another type of texture. This approach emerged six months ago from Valdese Weavers and is expected to expand as the impact of weave effects grows.
A few of the freshest paisley designs from Showtime are below.
