Crypton Collection Review: Brentano Crushes the Cityscape

One of the most exciting trends in contract fabric is a move toward intense, distinctive colors and exciting patterns. This new trend breaks through all of the myths about design limitations with contract performance fabrics. These looks could fall into the realm of any luxury interior textile, yet they offer the extraordinary performance required for more demanding spaces.

Brentano’s Cityscape Collection is one example of this design revolution. It captures the urban landscape in textile form. Design Director, Iris Wang, and the Brentano design studio were inspired by all senses stimulated within the metropolitan environment. They cite among their references towering skyscrapers, perpetual movement and the energetic sounds that pulse through any city.

The new collection includes vivid colors and graphic, large-scale patterns such as Boulevard. This bold stripe is an interpretation of the grandest type of urban street. It celebrates a tradition of generously scaled avenues, the type that have become destinations in and of themselves. The color and life of the Champs-Élysées, Park Avenue, Wilshire Boulevard and so many more are set down with style on a focal-point-ready textile.

Boulevard pattern from the Cityscape Collection by Brentano

Boulevard pattern from the Cityscape Collection by Brentano

INCASE Crypton Technology protects seven of the collection’s patterns and is suitable for hospitality, retail, office, education, healthcare and residential interiors. It works for all applications where performance is a must but a moisture barrier is not required.

If The New Yorker was a contract fabric, it would be Cityscape (see featured image at top of this post). The collection’s namesake pattern is a madcap mashup of hand-illustrated skyscrapers. Cityscape (somehow) creates the overall impression of a loose geometric crossed with an animal print. It offers the intellectual energy of the urban jungle juxtaposed with just enough whimsy.

Even the small-scale coordinates such as Metropolis and Boomtown and an uber-textural, micro-chevron pattern called Disco push the limits of expected design. Built for high-performance applications, all of the Cityscape patterns offer outstanding wearability, exceeding over 75,000 double rubs (Wyzenbeek).

Boomtown (left) and Metropolis (right) patterns from the Cityscape Collection by Brentano.

Boomtown (left) and Metropolis (right) patterns from the Cityscape Collection by Brentano.

Perhaps you’ve already specified some bold beauty from the Cityscape Collection and want to share it with us? Please do! You may see your work in an upcoming post in this space.

Stacy Garcia: A Design Star Composes a Collection

The arena of product design is both fiercely competitive and highly demanding, requiring tremendous focus, creativity, and an innate talent for forecasting. Like the designers their products serve, these creatives need to have both a strong right and left brain to achieve success. A deep technical knowledge and expertise in contract specification is critical. Stellar product design pro, Stacy Garcia, is at the top of this game, creating an array of brilliant products that are being widely specified in every sector of contract design. She’s also one of the kindest and most fun people we know, and that good karma seems to emanate from her designs, imbuing interiors with a distinctive, lively spirit.

Stacy Garcia

Stacy Garcia

Her line of Crypton-powered textiles called Composition is just such a collection. It bears her hallmark of combining a global perspective with a sophisticated, fashion-centric edge. Super-fierce geometrics recall classic themes such as argyle in a modern way. These dovetail with patterns that have a timeless look that could as easily have been inspired by natural phenomena such as honeycomb or flame as by technology (binary code) or handcraft (brush strokes). We’re guessing her influences include all of these touch points. Her fresh twist on the familiar is what makes these designs resonate.

Ms. Garcia is a successful creative entrepreneur and founder of multiple business enterprises: LebaTex, Inc., a distinctive textile supplier and Stacy Garcia, Inc., a licensing firm and design house. With brands like Stacy Garcia Commercial, Stacy Garcia | New York, and Stay by Stacy Garcia, she has partnered with some of the world’s leading manufacturers to create products that span from floor-to-ceiling in resorts and homes all over the world. Stacy says, “LebaTex is bringing to the commercial market a unique mix of style and performance with its collection of drapery and upholstery fabrics. They produce a well-rounded offering of Stacy Garcia Textiles with high-quality performance finishes like INCASE fabric protection by Crypton.” The fabrics are offered exclusively to the trade through D.L. Couch, Eykon Design Resources and TRI-KES.

Left: Geometry, Contour, Woodcut and Airbrush patterns in the blue green family. Right: Fresco is offered in jewel tones, hot brights and cool neutrals.

Left: Geometry, Contour, Woodcut and Airbrush patterns in the blue green family. Right: Fresco is offered in jewel tones, hot brights and cool neutrals.

Looking at her work, it isn’t hard to see why Stacy was voted one of the 10 leading voices in the hospitality industry and was honored by ASID for Design Excellence. Her work has been featured in many publications designers turn to for product recommendations, including Interior Design, Boutique Design, New York Spaces, LUXE, Rue Daily and Architectural Digest. If you haven’t already, you’ll probably get an opportunity to see Stacy on a design panel one of these days soon. Internationally renowned, she is highly sought out for her forecasting expertise and is an industry tastemaker.  She’s also a sometime-journalist, spreading her infectious enthusiasm for design via her blog, videos and online magazine: Life-Styled. We at Crypton are big fans, and look forward to many future collaborations.

Five patterns from the Stacy Garcia Composition Collection in one of contract design's most in-demand colors: grey.

Five patterns from the Stacy Garcia Composition Collection in one of contract design’s most in-demand colors: grey.

Designers, if you’ve specified the Composition Collection or any Stacy Garcia textiles with INCASE fabric protection, we’d love to see a photo of your work! We might even ask if we can feature it in our blog.

Product photos in this post courtesy Stacy Garcia Textiles. Stacy Garcia portrait as seen in Life-Styled magazine, spring 2017.