I can't get enough of vintage novelty "printspiration"; my Pinterest boards are full of novelty designs from the 1940s and 50s - atomic-inspired designs, conversational prints and abstracted florals. What's great about this book is that it puts 1950s fashion textile design in context. The introduction explains the social and artistic influences of the post-war era, including the 1951 Festival of Britain and modern innovations in production processes such as the introduction of an automatic screen printing process in 1957.
1950s Fashion Print is arranged into five sections: Abstraction; Narrative, Novelty & The Jive; Artistic Licence; Kinetic; Domestic. Images include reproduced print adverts and sample cards from textile manufacturers as well as full-page prints of fabrics themselves. Each chapter provides additional social context for motifs, style and application, along with commentary and designer/manufacturer details and technical specifications for sampled designs.
Stylised natural leaf shapes become an abstract pattern
Travel theme and ballerinas in Narrative
Tropical, Hawaiian-influenced designs
Wild West motifs
Not gonna lie - Narratives, Novelty & The Jive is my favourite section
The chapter on Kinetic designs includes abstracts and the classic 1950s boomerang, jacks and mobile designs.
Home & garden themes (including florals) feature in the chapter on Domestic motifs
This book is a wonderful discussion of the influences on fashion print design in the 1950s, and the 200+ full colour pictures provide a rich sourcebook of novelty prints of the era. Highly recommended for anyone with an interest in print design of the midcentury period.
