Guy Goodfellow: Matching Paint with Fine Fabrics

At Edward Bulmer Natural Paint we don’t follow trends nor do we declare a colour of the year. We have over 100 classic colours which create timeless interiors whatever your style. Whilst our paints may provide the canvas, sometimes ‘loud’ and sometimes ‘quiet’, we love to then see a room ‘sing’ adorned in beautiful fabrics with incredible design.
We see designers and homeowners alike dressing their rooms with the wonderful timeless fabrics from the Guy Goodfellow Collection on a backdrop of our paints, a natural partnership.

Edward was delighted to choose some of their beautiful fabrics and give you his tonal palette and chosen colours to pair with them, “Guy is one of those designers who has an innate sense of how to create comfort even in quite formal houses. He has a sensitivity to the architectural integrity of a place and an understanding of what underpins successful and useable pattern. His printed and woven cloths are a testament to this and well-drawn pattern is matched by beautiful colourways.”

Edward notes “In combining all the elements of interior design one needs a unifying tonality and we have found that when it comes to paint colours we are very much singing from the same hymn sheet as Guy and his design team. It has been a pleasure and nothing more, to select from our range, colours that we think perfectly compliment some of these iconic fabrics.”

Persian Vine was inspired by an antique tile image. The original, hand painted ceramic design featured a flower motif which was re-scaled and placed across the repeat carefully to enable a beautifully scaled, flowing print to be launched into our collection.

Perfectly paired with ‘London Brown’, being polychromatic we think brown goes with everything but in deeper hues it is particularly good at flattering beautiful, well drawn patterns. When a pattern has multiple colours one can pick one out but it needs to tone with the other, so here ‘Indigo’ does that while being green enough to work with the red print. If you want to go neutral, ‘Tawny’ has enough red ochre in it to draw out the colour of the base cloth without it appearing too yellow.”

Lotus, Azure  is a fantastic dual-toned geometric jacquard weave, Lotus is perfect for upholstery, blinds and curtains. Influenced by Indian Phulkari embroideries and complementing the existing Indus design in the Guy Goodfellow Collection, the design gives an alternative all-over geometric option for smart furniture, and distinctive window treatments.

If you want to go bold and big then look no further than ‘Naples Yellow’ which is a strong colour for those brave enough to couple it with other gutsy colour tones such a this vibrant blue fabric. If you want to go for a chic combination of Blue and brown ‘Mummy‘ has the right tonality and weight to pull it off. We also think the blues in this fabric would work well with a light complimenting blue, like our ‘Aerial Tint’, giving clarity and character to the deep blue of the warp is the service rendered here.

Cothay Stripe is a woven, vertical stripe that lends itself to upholstery due to its weight and composition. The combination of yarns have been chosen to create a tex- tured weave with difference and contrast across the width.

If you want to use a contracting colour we recommend ‘Nicaragua’ as it’s a complimentary contrast of equal weight and the required earthiness to offset this strong design. ‘Quaker’ would be a great neutral to use as it establishes the base cloth as a distinct hue but of the same tonal value. A bright tone with a little less weight than the pattern helps to give the fabric gravitas and texture, so for this we recommend our ‘Invisible Green’ to create a green ensemble of dreams!

Olive Sacking, Rosewood a design inspired by an piece of fabric originally used for sacking to collect olives on the Mediterranean periphery. It is hand woven in India to achieve the loose, open weave and softness of the original document.

For a deep pairing ‘Pompadour‘ is a strong choice for a powerful tonal compliment for the deep red stripe. If you are looking for a neutral colour to go with this fabric we recommend ‘Clove’ which has a hint of red ochre which binds it to the colourway and gives the case cloth freshness. For a perfect contrast use ‘Drab Green’ which is the right tone, weight and hue for this fabric, and of course it is a beautiful, rich colour!

Fez Weave, Sea Foam is woven to evoke the intricate geometry of traditional Moroccan embroidery, our most popular design has a large central medallion with a textured stripe either side.

‘Cinnamon’ is a spicy accompaniment, sufficiently neutral to support this colourway and with a dry warmth to celebrate it. If you want something more subtle to really let these fabrics sing we recommend our ‘Welmish Blew’ which is a ‘barely blue light blue’, but just enough to let Sea Foam’s tones do their thing. If you are thinking about going bolder ‘Aquatic’ is a confident colour that will bring out the Sea Foam’s blue green undertones, in Aquatic we offer a shade that comes down more on the bluey side.”

We hope you find these pairing useful, follow the links below to get your free colour chart and shop all Guy Goodfellow Collection fabrics!