“The creative unconscious is a wonderful thing,” says Lisa Peck, owner and principal designer, LiLu Interiors, Minneapolis, and founder of Sylvie & Mira, her line of fabrics, wallcoverings, and rugs. She’s talking about how her two new patterns for Sylvie & Mira came about: John’s Feather and Stitches.
Peck recalls a dream she had shortly after her father, John, passed away. She dreamt she was in New York City and picked a feather up off the sidewalk. “I looked into the symbolism of feathers and learned they’re a symbol of hope,” Peck says. “Then I painted this pattern and realized it related to my father.” The new pattern, she adds, “is a painted interpretation of a feather and a chevron.” The colorways include cream and aubergine, cream and pink, cream and navy, and cream and orange.
About the same time, Peck had a particular stitch on her mind, which she turned into a pattern called Stitches. She then realized that pattern was based on the Norwegian hardanger stitch, which she used to do as a child with help from her Norwegian grandmother—her mother’s mother. “So this one is about my Mom,” Peck says. “It’s a sweet filler pattern,” she adds, which comes in colorways including aqua and pink on a white background.
“It wasn’t intentional,” Peck says of creating new patterns inspired by her parents. Nonetheless, she’s grateful to have simply followed her artistic inclination. In 2014, Peck started Sylvie & Mira, reproducing her watercolors as digitally printed textiles that are fully alive with every nuance of the original.
“My collection was created from a unique combination of practical experience, firsthand exploration, and resolute courage,” she states on her website. “It was named after my two beautiful daughters who show me how to look at the world differently and challenge its conventions.” Leap, already a Sylvie & Mira favorite, has also been recently released in new colorways.
