Recently in design Category

No excuse for posting this, other than these are some of the loveliest ceramic tiles I have ever seen.

They are on the walls at the edge of a courtyard in the Forbidden City, one of a group on the west side that has been recently renovated and re-opened to visitors. This particular wall is the Imperial Telephone Exchange (no, I didn't know that existed before today, either). The grouping of courtyards mostly consists of residential quarters of the former empress CiXi and her entourage.

The design is a Wanzi lattice, a familiar Chinese lattice design that can also be seen on wood carvings, carpets and other decorative objects. "Wanzi" means "ten thousand" and the design (like most things Chinese) has an auspicious meaning, in this case for the birth of many sons.

I have used a similar lattice (though without the slight compression seen here) in a traditional-contemporary carpet design:  Chinese lattice design carpet.

Following my last posting on the Snow Lion doll designed by Susie Vickery and Tibetan artisans at the Dropenling handicrafts center in Lhasa, Susie wrote from Lhasa enclosing some photos of prototypes for next season that she is working on.

Seen here are two new glove puppets with Tiger and Snow Lion designs. These will be on sale in Dropenling next year. The gentleman in the center is Arthur Holcombe, founder of the Tibet Poverty Alleviation fund and the Dropenling center. He is not for sale.

Exceedingly friendly, in a tongue-hanging out kind of way, this is the new snow lion from the Dropenling Handicrafts Center in Lhasa, run by the Tibet Artisan Initiative.

He was created by Susie Vickery, a former RSC costume designer, who visited Lhasa last year to work with traditional Tibetan tailors and applique workers to create the snow lion and other Tibetan dolls. The artisans are using traditional applique skills that are used for making religious banners and door hangings, but applied in a new way.

The snow lion is a traditional animal in Tibet, the seat of Vaishravana (Namtose), the god of wealth and the King of the Northern Direction, often seen in paintings in both secular and religious contexts, as well as in sculptures around Lhasa.

The snow lion has been such a hit that Susie is back in Lhasa right now, designing new animals for next year. The Dropenling team will be visiting Beijing later this month and attending some of the pre-Christmas bazaars and bringing some snow lions with them. I will be posting a list of the bazaars we will be attending later this month.

The Tibet Artisan Initiative's website is at www.tibetcraft.com

For those that can't wait, I have a few of these guys in my Torana store in the Kempinski hotel in Beijing.

We've just received a new shipment of Tibetan cashmere shawls at our Torana Beijing store, so I'm going to take the opportunity here to describe what Cashmere is ... and also what it isn't.

Cashmere is a very fine, soft material that is neither wool nor hair. It comes from the Pashmina goats (hence it's alternative name) that live at high altitudes. In the case of our cashmere, that means Tibet.

The altitude is important, because the purpose of the downy cashmere is to keep the goat warm in winter. Many animals living at high elevations grow cashmere coats under their outer fur or hair, even yaks (the yak version of cashmere is called kulu), but the type from the pashmina goat is the whitest and softest available. Pashmina goats live very happily at lower altitudes, but they don't produce good cashmere if the weather is too warm.

The material got its name "Cashmere" because it became popular in Europe in the 17th and 18th centuries and the country doing most of the weaving of Tibetan cashmere in those days was Kashmir. In those days most shawls were woven with traditional paisley designs from the Kashmiri weaver's traditional repertoire. Today shawl designs are a great deal more varied and they are made in several locations around the Himalayas.

These days a great many shawls and scarves are on sale in China and elsewhere that are called "Cashmere" or "Pashmina". The problem for the buyer is that these include a range of materials from Tibetan cashmere (best, because of the altitude) through Mongolian cashmere (lesser quality) to New Zealand wool (artificially fluffed to make it seem like cashmere). Until you are familiar with the real thing these materials can be difficult to tell apart. Most of the inexpensive "Cashmere" that I have seen on sale in Beijing is not cashmere at all. This includes the countless shawls in shades of chemical pink and blue that are sold in the markets here.

Cashmere can also be bought in pure form, or in blends with silk. The pure form is more expensive, not only because of the cashmere content, but because it is slower and more difficult to weave than thread blended with silk. In Torana we have both pure cashmere shawls and 70%cashmere/30% silk shawls, the pure shawls being about twice the price of the blends. Both are attractive and woven and designed to the same standard so this is a matter of choice and budget.

Aside from considerations of fiber content, weave quality is also critical with cashmere. A very light touch is needed to bring out the best in the fiber, and good cashmere should have a "floaty" feel as well as being soft.

Finally, as with any luxury item, design is just as important as materials. Good quality cashmere is usually synonymous with good color and design, since it is worthwhile to employ a good designer to make the most of the best material.

There are some pictures of (some of) our new designs on this page of our website.

Greetings from Lhasa (I arrived yesterday on a trip to visit our workshop here).

The atmosphere is very different here compared with my last trip in July. Tourists are returning, both local and from overseas. The restaurants are back open (huzzah! more than one place to eat!) and the traders are looking marginally happier. The weather is still decent, though cooling off a bit, and Lhasa residents are out proving the truth of the saying "whereever you find a patch of green, you fill find a Tibetan sitting on it". This includes traffic islands.

Pictured here is one of the new designs that has just come off the loom, that I am pleased with, photographed after washing but before the final trim. Well done Norbu and team. The design is based on one of the imperial seals used by the Kangxi Emperor (1661-1722), one of the two longest serving and most successful emperors of the Qing dynasty. Hope he won't mind me stealing his seal design.

The rug measures about 6ftx6ft (Imperial measures - what else?).

At our Torana An Fu Lu store in Shanghai we have a show ongoing of Chinese silk textile fragments. These range from small pieces like the red silk brocade fragment shown here at far left, up to a complete silk tapestry robe panel from around 1800.

Most of these pieces I've collected in Tibet over the last decade during my regular trips to our workshop in Lhasa. The association between Tibet and Chinese silk textiles might not seem an obvious one at first sight, but in fact it's one of the best places to find old silk, particularly earlier pieces from the Ming dynasty (1353-1644) that interest me most. Chinese silk was used in Tibetan ceremonial robes, altar cloths and other items, and the state of preservation in Tibetan temples is usually better than that found in other parts of China.

As a rug designer, I'm particularly interested in the Ming fragments since they show some of the best characteristics of Ming design: bold designs, a fondness for flowing curves and generous shapes, a nice balance of "figure" and "ground" and a certain freedom and experimentation that is often lacking in designs from later periods.

Cloud designs from this period are a particular favorite of mine, and something I've used in carpet designs for Torana. As an example, I've included a fragment of a red silk cloud brocade that originally formed part of a Tibetan lama's robe, with a Torana rug design (below) that is based on similar cloud shapes. The colors in the carpet design are not characteristically Chinese though, the blue tones on a red ground were inspired by Indonesian batiks (another story entirely).

Textile designs from the Ming period remained fashionable in the early part of the Qing dynasty (17th century), but were replaced at the Chinese court in Beijing by new decorative styles from the 18th century onwards.

The An Fu Lu store show will run during September and October 2008. A map and contact details for our store are at this link.

First of all, let me say straight away that I am not a sentimentalist when it comes to Beijing's old Hutong (courtyard house) districts. Aside from the wealthiest merchant homes, most of them were not built to a high standard and not the greatest places to live in today, unless you enjoy brushing your teeth by a standpipe in the yard in the middle of winter. That said, a city's past is important, and while not everything can or should be preserved, it's incumbent on the present generation to make sure that there are some reminders of Beijing's past left for those who will come after.

This is where the Beijing Cultural Heritage Protection Center come in. For the past several years they have been quietly promoting conservation-standard techniques and materials to home owners wanting to restore old hutong areas. This is important because the standard method in the past has (all too often) been to pull the old building down entirely and build a vaguely hutong-like structure out of reinforced concrete to replace what was there before. The CHP have been promoting the traditional Beijing style in which the main structure of the building is built around wooden columns, supporting a traditional roof held up by a bracket arrangement, with the brightly painted eaves that are characteristic of Beijing architecture.

Aside from technical competence, the main factor behind the CHP's success with their approach has been a committed (and local) membership, rather than the expat-driven approach which has characterised many conservation efforts over the years.

For more information about the CHP's program, take a look at their website (English and Chinese).

This rarely seen atmospheric sky type phenomenon is known as a "blue sky". Apparently familiar to inhabitants of other parts of the globe, but rare around here.

Checking the color chart, the name of this shade is Regatta, and the Pantone reference is 18-4039 TPX. I think it would look good on a set of coffee cups, or a swimming pool, but it's a bit too vivid for the sky.

It is accompanied by pleasantly warm temperatures, balmy breezes...

pinch me. I must be dreaming.

Torana Squares are novel carpet designs that we have created exclusively for the NEST design collective in Shanghai. Details and a full list of designs are on our website

We've departed from the normal rectangular format, as well as from the colors and patterns you'd expect to see on a carpet.

These rugs are still made at our workshop in Lhasa, from pure Tibetan wool and with the same care and attention that we put into all our carpets. The brilliant shades have all been achieved with non toxic, azo free dyes which are fully absorbed onto the wool and hence safe for the environment (as well as for our customers!).

They are available in sizes ranging from 3ftx3ft, 4ftx4ft, 5ftx5ft and upwards.
For our Shanghai customers, Torana Squares are on sale exclusively at the NEST design collective on Tai Kang Lu (see previous-but-one post in this blog for details). We hope to make them available to our Beijing customers soon, and they can also be ordered in the meantime.

Don't be put off by the title, NEST is a SHOP where you can BUY THINGS, in Shanghai's Tai Kang Lu.

Shanghai residents will know this area already. For those of you coming from further away, ie Beijing, (and it is rumored that there are places even further away than Beijing), Tai Kang Lu is an old district of narrow streets that has been taken over by cafe owners, designers, photographers, ceramicists, jugglers, sorbet-makers and other global flotsam.

Nest was started by designer Trine Targett (Jooi), who invited fellow designers to make unique products especially for the NEST space. The NEST line-up now includes Rachel Speth and Jeff Delkin (Bambu), whose remarkable lacquered bamboo artistry is pictured at left or whereever the damned image appears, does Movable Type suck or what? , clothing by Lisa Wen (Brown Rice), Jammy Yang's novel lighting designs (Y Town), Grace Liu's delicate ceramics (AsianEra), paper art from Paper Tiger, Sherry Poon's organic cotton babywear (Wobaby), Sacha Silva's remarkable furniture (A00) as well as founder Trine's textile works ... and carpets from Torana.

These people are all my friends, so expect lots of shameless plugs thoughtful, objective coverage of this venture over the coming weeks.

There is more information on NEST, a map and so on on their website.