Textiles Today

by Chloe Colchester

A survey of contemporary textiles from around the original, inspiring, colorful, experimental designs. Textile design is both one of the least and one of the most localized of the arts. Textiles owe their development and evolution to religion, commerce, and travel, and their vibrant and creative preservation to tenacious regionalism. In the recent past, artists and designers from different backgrounds―India, Mali, Madagascar, Morocco, Burkina Faso, Nigeria―have reinvigorated art and fashion by using the fabrics and graphic elements they find on the streets of New York, Paris, London, and other cities to project an alternative vision of textile culture on the international stage. The diversity of the textile world makes it both exciting and provocative as it brings together a wide range of otherwise fragmented images and perspectives. Extraordinary technological developments, from color-changing, light-sensitive camouflage to emergency shelters of cement-impregnated fabric bonded to an inflatable plastic, are included here alongside the simply beautiful, such as Eley Kishimoto's patterns that point to the historical exchange of ideas between the East and the West, or the astonishing color transmutations of Morphotex, a fiber of multilayer optical interference. 381 color illustrations

208 pages, Hardcover

First published October 29, 2007

Reviews

[Juliezs · Rating 5 out of 5]

Here I thought this would just be a pretty picture book, with some textile stuff from around the world, a'la FiberArts magazine. Well, it is that, but the writing is terrific, and so interesting. Covers history, current scientific research being applied and used in textiles, military funding, textiles as shelter, recycling and "green" technologies. One of my favorite sections was on fiber being used in buildings, including quite a bit about the swim cube in Beijing. A whole lot of info in this book, that I had no clue about, and pretty pictures to boot.

[Rebecca · Rating 4 out of 5]

Looks at how textile designs have addressed technology-oriented lifestyle by doubling their functionality as architectural structure and space maker, collapsible furniture, interactive technology linked with cellular communication, housing for homeless, and more. The title says it all, in that it gives an up to date survey of the use of textiles today, but it additionally references many exciting designers working right now.