These Bandana Tiles Are Our New Favorite Design Detail
She's designed a home line for Versace (inspired by THAT famous Grammy's dress), made a staircase go viral, reimagined the museum, and just launched fabric this month, but one thing design darling Sasha Bikoff hadn't done—until now—was dabble in tile. That's not to say she hadn't been thinking about it, though: "I've wanted to do tile for awhile," the designer tells House Beautiful. Well, we can exclusively reveal that she's finally made it happen, through a line with New Ravenna which, like everything this maximalist touches, is unlike anything you've seen before.
Called "The New World" in homage to the onetime name for our continent by its newcomers, the collection is inspired by all things America, the result of a fascination with tile from other parts of the world. "I think of tile as being really connected to a sense of place," Bikoff says, citing Portugal and the Middle East as places with long traditions of the medium. "But I thought, America doesn't really have a signature tile."
So, she decided to create one, incorporating influences from across history. First, she considered the exploration of "the new world" by Europeans, poring over a copy of Joan Bleau's Atlas Maior, an expansive 17th century volume of illustrated cartography. One of Bleau's maps—reproduced exactly–would become the basis of a massive, 44" x 80" mural in the collection. To complement the map of the Earth, Bikoff also developed a mural based on Ptolemy's cosmic map.
But don't worry—there are more standard-sized tiles, too: for the collection's smaller pieces, the designer looked to different textile traditions across America.
"I love the playfulness of turning a textile into a tile," Bikoff says. First up: the paisley bandana motif, a print universally recognized across the U.S. "This is a print that started in India, but it came to really represent America," the Bikoff explains. She designed two bandana patterns—one for the east and one for the west coast—with colors that invoke different elements of the country (Alpine, Coal). "I like the idea of something that's so common being made into a high-end mosaic," she says.
In addition to the bandana print, Bikoff designed three lace patterns. "I started thinking about all the women who came to America and the crafts they brought," says Bikoff. The three types of lace—Swiss Dot, Point d'Angleterre, and Queen Mary—are meant to symbolize the traditions these women imported to the U.S.
Both the bandana and the lace motifs have complimentary border tile (Bikoff also designed a star-spangled border pattern to reflect Ptolemy's cosmos as well as the familiar stars on our flag), making it easier than ever to incorporate elements of the collection even just as accents. But, if you're looking for inspiration to go all-out, you'll soon have it: "I'm going to be installing a ton of the collection at my house in the Hamptons," Bikoff reveals. We're sure it will be nothing short of show-stopping.
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