Moodboard from the O&L studio wall

The studio moodboards included pictures of pottery with wonderful glazes in beautiful natural colours, and Japanese interiors with sliding doors and paired back interiors. Sketchbooks were filled with experimental brushstrokes and ink washes. They tried imprinting different weave textures into rolled out clay to create interesting embossed textures, and folding paper to create geometric shapes.

Imprinting into clay in the O&L studio

Evidence of these initial explorations are found throughout the collection, from the brush marks across KOZO STRIPE, to the way SHOJI VINYL is reminiscent of tradtional Japanese interiors and KUTANI VINYL is inspired by origami.

The large-scale KANOKO design (available as both fabric and wallpaper) was inspired by traditional tie-dying, the stripes in the design have the lovely soft edges synonymous with tie-dyed fabrics. The smaller scale HAKAMI fabric features an intricate pattern reminiscent of Shibori.

Examples of Shibori dye technique, taken from our Pinterest page. Shibori artists tightly sew together patterns within the fabric before it is dyed. After dying the fabric the patterning emerges.

The KANOKO collection is available in a range of colours that complement and stay true to these time-honoured techniques. “We looked to nature for KANOKO’s colour palette” exploring a wide range of natural pigments including indigo, celadon, linen, and earthy tones like burnt sienna.

Specifically, the colour indigo, a signature in Japanese crafts seemed to infiltrate everyone’s minds in the studio simultaneously:

See the full KANOKO collection in the links below