Paisley Parked . . . in my Subconscious
I'm addicted to paisley and so is the design world.
My friend Leeann is a popular interior designer in our Chicago suburb — the type who’s barely online since word-of-mouth referrals keep her fully booked. Recently, over cocktails, we agreed that people tend to dress the same way they decorate. Our conversation didn’t start with my outfit, but it could have: I was wearing the blue & white paisley Kalinda dress from Maison Hotel and sitting on a blue & white paisley chair in my living room. It is, in fact, one of four paisley-bedecked chairs in my home, and I nearly added another two this summer. The night before, I’d slept in the paisley-print cotton pajamas my husband bought me for Christmas. An ad for the Anna Sui Beardsley paisley set was stalking me across Instagram, only the price tag and the miniskirt aspect saving me from myself. Paisley infiltrated my life without me noticing, and suddenly, I’m surrounded by it.
Those of us who love pattern often have a favorite type. My mother loves overblown florals, while my next-door neighbor favors stripes. These patterns must strike a subconscious cord somewhere inside us. They seem to echo who we envision ourselves to be. My neighbor looks like she stepped out of a Nora Ephron film and she decorates like it — clean lines, stripes, and all.
I can trace my love of paisley directly back to the resurgence of 1960s & '70s style in my 1990s teendom. My friends and I — Catholic schoolgirls, one and all — loved punk ‘zines and the women of ‘90s alternative rock. We combined this with a simultaneous fixation on Led Zeppelin, The Doors, and classic rock — and the continent-hopping, rock & roll lifestyles of the female musicians and socialites from the same era. We shopped Delia’s clothes via catalog, thrifted hippie jackets at the Ragstock in Lakeview, and mashed them into our own era-clashing, rock-inspired style.
As much as I loved Bikini Kill and Hole, I was a quiet, literary kid, who dreamed of writing and travel. I was drawn to photos of Marisa Berenson in caftans and Marianne Faithfull’s bangs. They’d been a part of the first youth wave to upend fashion and music. To a girl in the American midwest, their travel and lavish parties abroad were a tantalizing mix of glamour and adventure. Cecil Beaton’s famous photograph of Lee Radziwell lounging in a paisley-swathed room might be my Roman Empire. My house has plenty of florals. I’m writing this surrounded by geometric-embossed grasscloth. Still, paisley seems to be my own little cult favorite.
Culture has moved past equating Eastern styles with exoticism or mysticism, but paisley hasn’t shaken its connection with a life well-traveled. While the pattern dates back over 2000 years, it arrived in the West via luxury shawls from Kashmir, an origin story that still impacts how we see it today. Its signature curved tear-drops are called boteh or buto. This evocative shape is part of paisley’s appeal - depending on how it’s drawn, it looks like a teardrop, or a pear, or a symbol for fertility. Its historic past gives its weight that stretches long before the psychedelic era that led me to it.
Its English name derives from the industrial mill town of Paisley, Scotland, where local textile manufacturers began emulating Kashmir scarves on a cheaper, faster scale. These shawls became wildly popular, and like many design trends, paisley leapt from fashion into interior textiles. William Morris was known for his artistic interpretations, and Liberty London also created beautiful paisleys. Of course, by the mid-20th century, paisley had taken a turn for the wildly, offensively tacky, notably the eye-watering hues of 1960s shift dresses. Only Prince — who famously named his house Paisley Park — was blessed with the charisma to look sexy in satin paisley suit. For the rest of us, restraint is best.
Schumacher has some truly incredible paisley patterns, including Shirala and Ambala. If any of you have Shirala on throw pillows, send me pics and know that I’m envious. I have an unloved, undecorated windowseat I’d love to cover in paisley pillows, but my family might stage an intervention. Like many modern, non-Prince paisleys, Schumacher’s paisleys work because their colorways are modern and crisp. Liberty London has their Paisley Fern pattern, and the Italian clothing brand Etro has made it the signature print of their wealthy boho clientele. The trick to a chic paisley seems to be simplicity, as counter-intuitive as that might seem (but not so simple it’s a bandana). It needs to lean artsy not riotous. Lucky for us, paisley seems to be everywhere right now, in great interpretations and very little satin. Here’s a small curation of paisley picks…
Paisley at Home
Paisley to Wear
Shopping Links: 1.Pillows 2. Unframed Print 3 Napkins 4. Trousers 5. Earring 6. Cashmere Shawl