Vanessa Arbuthnott Fabrics – The Forest Collection
Vanessa Arbuthnott Fabrics – The Forest Collection
We are thrilled to introduce you to Vanessa’s latest fabric creation, The Forest Collection. Her immersion in nature has inspired this collection of forest style fabrics perfect for our made to measure curtains, furniture and home furnishings.
Themes inspired by natural woodlands and forests brings the outside in like only Vanessa can! Ever conscious of the environment, inherent in Vanessa’s work practices and mirrored in her designs which burst with beautiful imagery of the world around us.
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During the Spring of 2021 when museums were closed and travel was limited, it was the natural world around her which fueled her imagination. Vanessa spent many hours experimenting with the art of potato printing, carving, and then hand printing more and more intricate and delicate shapes. Exploring the interplay between negative and positive spaces.
“The flawless and fascinating shapes of ferns have captivated me since I was a child. I would while away hours walking through forests and woods, collecting fern fronds and taking them home to press and draw. I was endlessly captivated by their forms; sometimes symmetrical and other times not.”
A little behind the scenes, where the magic happens in Vanessa’s kitchen with the humble potato.
Here is Vanessa speaking first hand about her design process, including the potato prints and process above, in our ‘New Forest’ highlights on Instagram.
New designs for 2022
Five designs in a total of 27 colourways. Four are printed on a unique eco-cloth, woven from 60% linen and 40% organic cotton yarns especially for Vanessa in Lancashire, Britain. The fifth design is my first foray into embroidered We have introduced beautiful new colours including Ochre, Lichen, Marigold and Moss. The fifth fabric design is a most striking, contemporary woven stripe in an earthy soft orange called Carrot.
All of the new colours have been carefully chosen to compliment Vanessa’s colour palette allowing seamless integration with previous collections and current trends.
Buy Forest Collection fabrics as made to measure curtains.
Wild Fern
This is a simple, printed asymmetrical stylized fern leaf – with shapes down the centre reflecting the line of dotty structures you see on the reverse of fronds, commonly called fruit dots. As flowerless plants, ferns use these structures as cases that hold their reproductive material
Duck Egg, Smoke / Soft Cornflower, Speedwell
Little Fern
This design is a smaller scale negative version of the Wild Fern, reminiscent of Indian block prints
Tomato / Mallow / Lily Pink / Peach
Ochre / Moss / Lichen / Speedwell
Soft Cornflower / Cornflower / Scree / Charcoal
Sow and Scatter
I designed this relaxed and fun print using potatoes cut in the positive form, scanned in my marks, then used the computer to turn it into a negative pattern
Lattice Leaf
I have always loved the structure of a trellis and here, I have taken the bud from my Life and Eternity Detail design, and encapsulated it inside this lattice
Soft Cornflower, Peach / Lily Pink, Mallow / Ochre, Lichen
Moss, Damson / Soft Cornflower, Moss / Moss, Cornflower / Scree, Soft Cornflower
New Linen Union Weave: MALMO
Striking and contemporary stripe, woven with a blend of organic cotton and linen in an earthy soft orange called Carrot. This beautiful new design also incorporates embroidery
New colourways of existing designs:
Lapland Stripe
This woven linen stripe is an old favourite and has been re-coloured to coordinate with these new prints, combining soft pinks and blues
Soft Cornflower, Cornflower, Damson, Lily Pink
Up the Garden Path
We have added new colours of this beautiful design
Day Lily / Light Lichen / Soft Cornflower / Cornflower
Life and Eternity Detail
An early block print of mine, now in more colours to coordinate perfectly with my other designs
Tomato / Ochre / Cornflower
Simple Ticking Detail
This timeless striped design now comes in Peach, Marigold, Lichen, and Cornflower
Peach / Marigold / Lichen / Cornflower
Stockholm Stripe
This is the first time I’ve printed a Stockholm Stripe design on Linen Union cloth
Scree, Soft Cornflower, Charcoal
We sell fabrics exclusively designed by Vanessa Arbuthnott, along side small, bespoke collection of Made to Measure items which includes curtains, blinds, sofas, footstools, chairs, headboards, and quilts, all handmade specially for you by master crafts people.
