Textile, Caravan

Travel inspired the designers at the Studio, including Larsen, and many of the textiles and several collections from the Larsen Design Studio grew from observations and inspirations while on these journeys. In Caravan, the designer, Anita Askild, was inspired by the richness of Moorish architecture and ornamentation. Part of the African collection at Larsen, the textile is composed of vertical bands that are studded with jewel-like motifs in the colors of semi-precious stones, and made even more sumptuous by being hand-printed on a velvet.
The company was particularly famous for printing on velvets and in 1959 was the first company to do so in the United States. In an interview with Stephanie Zollinger at the Goldstein Gallery of Art (University of Minnesota, 2009) Larsen discussed the difficulty of this technique: "…the big job on the printed velvet was finding, or creating, the right velvet. Normal velvets have a rather long, dense pile and the print would only be on the top of it and then it would be white underneath. It would also---if you wore it very much, the color would abrade and the white would show, so we worked with an American mill to develop a very dense, low pile velvet on which we could print. It also had to be open enough that the dye could penetrate to the base of the pile. Almost all of the pile was involved." By using cotton the dye could penetrate the length of the short fiber. Larsen explained that they tried it on different piles: "Mohair was glorious, but it took five days to dry." An additional requirement for the velvet was a secure construction to ensure that the surface would not be adversely altered during the dye process or in use. After printing, an acrylic backing was applied to further secure the pile structure. (1)
(1) Interview with Jack Lenor Larsen by Stephanie Zollinger. Goldstein Gallery of Art, University of Minnesota. May 21,2009.

Textile, Caravan; Designed by Anita Askild (American, b. Sweden, 1933–1980); Produced by Jack Lenor Larsen Incorporated (United States); cotton, acrylic latex (?) finish on reverse; H x W: 151.1 × 138.7 cm (59 1/2 × 54 5/8 in.); Cowtan and Tout Larsen Archive Collection, Gift of Longhouse Reserve; 2016-32-4