Heal’s unveils first own-brand fabric collection since 1970s, and coordinating home accessories range.

Zandra Rhodes' Top Brass 2 design features her signature pink colourway for Heal's
newly launched own-label fabric collection. 

This design above is by British designer Zandra Rhodes.  Entitled Top Brass 2, it was originally designed in 1963 for the British furniture and home furnishing store Heal's and was created while Rhodes was still studying at The Royal College of Art London.  The medal motif was inspired by a David Hockney painting and the bold colour palette is representative of the Pop Art period.  Rhodes is one of the designers whose designs are featured in Heal's newly launched own-brand fabric collection.

Cressida Bell’s decorative Trees is richly detailed and heavily influenced by the 1930s and 1940s trends.

While Heal's stocks a number of top designer brands, including the likes of Missoni, Marimekko, Osborne and Little and Ralph Lauren,  now, for the first time since the 1970s, Heal’s has launched its own fabric range, championing design talents both from the UK and the European continent.

Pia Benham, Heal’s Head of Fabric & Design comments: “As part of the relaunch of Heal’s historic fabric department, we wanted to extend our current fabric offering. We hope the new collection will help further strengthen our fabric department’s position as the destination for unique and exciting designs, a place that can inspire our customers and enable them to make their homes a beautiful place to live in. We also wanted to inject fun and excitement into our Heal’s fabric design once again, by working with established as well as emerging designers – in the same way we did in the 1950s and 1960s.”

Lady Jane by Petra Börner is designed to resemble a scattered bouquet of rough cuts from the garden. The idea was derived from horticultural images taken from vintage books. 

Tea Time design by the late Diana Bloomfield reflects the 1950s period in which it was first designed. 

Cloud by Emily Patrick, based on one of the designer’s own paintings, a sky study, features her strong brushwork creating a tranquil painted effect

In addition to fashion designer Zandra Rhodes, the line-up includes textile artist Cressida Bell, figurative painter Emily Patrick, textile expert Paul Vogel, silk weaver Ottilie Stevenson, from the archive of the late Diana Bloomfield (with the help of her daughter Julia and her graddaughter-in-law Linda), as well as French illustrator Malika Favre, Swedish textiles designer Petra Borner, and Danish designers Hvass & Hannibal.

Hvass & Hannibal’s Herbarium uses the forest as its main theme for a distinctively Scandinavian feel.

Malika Favre’s exotic Peacock Flower is a bold, geometric interpretation of a floral theme. 

While the designers ingeniously use colour and patterns to highlight their individual style, some have been inspired by Heal’s heritage for this exclusive collection, others have taken ideas from vintage sources, drawing inspiration from fabric archives, or take inspiration from decorative arts, nature and even jewellery.   Geometrics and nature are popular themes. 

To design this Zig Zag pattern, Ottilie Stevenson looked to Art Deco jewellery  in particular the shapes and lines created by the gold chain links of 1940s necklaces. 

A design from Paul Vogel’s Stripe series, inspired by Heal’s own archives but uses Spring 2014’s colour trends to give it a modern twist. 

Some of the designs are in 100% cotton hopsack, such as those by  Zandra Rhodes’ Top Brass 2, Hvass & Hannibal’s Herbarium, and Malika Favre’s Peacock flower, others are in a cotton/linen/nylon mix.

Many people probably do not know that Heal’s has been going for more than two centuries.  Presently with six stores in the chain selling a wide range of furniture, lighting, interior furnishing, homewares and garden products, Heal’s started out as a feather-dressing business.   Its flagship has been at the Tottenham Court Road location in London since the mid 1800’s , and today it also sells its products on-line.
To coincide with the launch of their own-brand fabric collection, Heal’s has introduced a coordinating home accessory line, Heal’s 1810, to complement the new offering.  Named after the year in which the company was established, Heal’s 1810 includes kitchen textiles, trays, cushions and stationery, all of which feature selected patterns from the new fabric range.
Pia Benham adds, “It’s been a wonderful journey working with all the designers on our new fabrics, and we loved their designs so much that we decided to go further with some of the patterns and apply them to home accessories. As such, we have produced a whole new collection around those patterns, and that’s exactly how Heal’s 1810 came about.
“We wanted to give our customers different options to incorporate those patterns into their design schemes, whether it be using our new fabrics for soft furnishings and light upholstery, or introducing Heal’s 1810 accessories to their homes for a simple style update.”