Fashion royalty Giles Deacon reveals his fabrics and wallpapers for Sanderson
British fashion designer Giles Deacon is no stranger to using fabric to make stunning transformations. Usually this involves delicately manipulating it to shape a bodice, expertly gathering it at a waist or letting voluminous folds fill out a full skirt. His couture creations are feats of fantasy, unsurprisingly in high demand from celebrities and collectors across the world, but now he’s turning this mastery of materials to new ends with his first range of furnishing fabrics and wallpapers for perhaps the country’s most famous heritage textile manufacturer, Sanderson.
As with many of the group’s collections, the starting point was the brand’s extensive archives, where Deacon trawled for hours through fragments of faded documents, original artworks and notes. ‘It was absolutely extraordinary on so many levels,’ he says, still visibly enthused by the delights he found there. ‘From a visual perspective it’s fascinating, but it also reveals so much about that sense of heritage, and you can see the transition of social history as designs change. I found it thoroughly intriguing.’
Despite being given free rein to choose to work with any of the group’s brands, Deacon immediately went for Sanderson. ‘I really felt it was the natural home for me,’ he explains, ‘as there was a definite synergy. It’s quintessentially British, and there’s that sense of craftsmanship and the illustrative aspect of so much of what they do – that really spoke to me.’
For a creative used to the relentless seasonal treadmill of fashion, the lengthy timeline involved – more than two years – has resulted in a plentiful and varied collection. ‘I said to Lisa Montague, Sanderson’s CEO, if we’re going to do it, let’s really do it,’ says Deacon, and he has more than stayed true to his word. Interweaving medieval influences and Greek mythology, he has deftly reworked archive Sanderson floral designs and combined them with illustrative and utilitarian elements from his own couture collections.
As he says, ‘It was very important to me for it to be a collection as a whole, to be something new. It had to have substantial elements of my world built into it.’
So there are the chintzy blooms you’d expect, such as ‘Lakeland Paradis’ and ‘Trelliage’, heavy with Sanderson nostalgia and created by combining two 19th-century patterns. The faded grandeur of the batik-style print ‘Fringed Tulip Toile’ sits alongside the charming ‘Cupid’s Beau’, an original design given a Giles Deacon hit with the designer’s signature illustrative bows and calligraphy ‘G’. Elsewhere, his iconic ‘Aperigon’ stripe appears in various iterations, its pinked, tooth-edged bands adding modernity and the perfect edge to the botanicals.
More contemporary still is perhaps the most subversive of Deacon’s designs, a reworking of a pattern from a 2004 collection, which appears on a soft sheen Jacquard ‘Bantam Net’ and the luscious ‘Faraday’ velvet. The repetitive diamond lattice on closer inspection reveals itself as a delicate chicken-wire motif. As he comments, ‘There’s just something fabulous about turning something potentially mundane into something incredibly beautiful.’
Wallpapers include ‘Aurelia’s Grail’, an Arthurian legend of trompe-l’œil created by Deacon, bursting with rambling roses, unicorns and medieval damsels in a Jacquard design. ‘Wilsford’ is a dramatic archive Sanderson pattern, all ruched drapes, bows, swags and tassels, while the showstopper is undoubtedly ‘Pygmalion’, a three-metre-high, four-panel mural design depicting rococo dolphins, giant artichokes and architectural detailing in a baroque style, which took six months to create.
This intrinsic, unabashed theatricality, influenced by the likes of Oliver Messel and Rex Whistler, is found throughout the collection, and emphasises the point that this is the work of a man used to putting on a show. Whether it’s one of his catwalk presentations, his work with the New York City Ballet or the flashbulb frenzy his creations generate on the red carpet, Deacon knows how to create impact.
‘I love that sense of theatre and conversation,’ he says, ‘that transportative nature of beauty, almost exiting into another dimension of sorts. I really love all of that.’
Deacon is quick to point out that he is a designer, not a decorator, and there’s a definite confidence in how the collection has been curated that speaks to his background. ‘How
I approach a bespoke dress for a client and a wallpaper is actually quite similar,’ he reveals. ‘How the iterations move on is where the skill of the Sanderson designers comes in. They really know their onions, and I loved learning all of that. I loved the collaborative aspect of working with them.’
Deacon’s gratitude to them is palpable. He has clearly enjoyed being able to work with the Sanderson team to create something that has a timelessness. Yes, there is an anticipation to see how the pieces are used across the world, and to discover what the commercial successes will be, but as Deacon sums up in his typically down-to-earth way: ‘All that’s great, but you need the magic, you need the beauty and, with a truly British heritage brand like Sanderson, it’s a real privilege to get your mitts on it and get in there.’ sandersondesigngroup.com
