Hello and welcome to the Interior Design Podcast. This is episode three and today
we have got James Lewis coming in from Sunbury Fabrics to educate us about
upholstery fabric. So we're going to have a quick catch up for the week
first. Just me and Cheryl before we bring James in because I think he's
waiting outside you know. So Cheryl you've been on holiday? I've been on holiday for two
weeks which was lovely and now back straight into the thick of it. So I am
currently working on a project in London which is a salon and so that's
exciting. I've done all of the kind of legwork before I went away, draft, general
arrangements and stuff but now I kind of get into the nitty-gritty of it really.
So yeah I've got that one to sink my teeth in but what about you? Oh God
we're so busy. Chinese floating restaurant in Canary Wharf. I'm project
managing it I'm not designing it. All of the plans in Chinese? And we've had to
translate them all and I thought oh yeah that'll be easy I'll just put it through
a translation document Google. No it's not as been as easy as that. So we had to
go into cabinet and edit every single annotation on probably about a hundred
drawings. I was like oh I wasn't quite aware. So that's just project management you're doing on that one is it? Yeah but the other jobs we're doing
we're doing some really cool projects in central London at the moment we've got
three all owned by one person they're all really cool high-end places. We've
got one that's right near Liverpool Street which has got five floors and
they just want to redo the whole thing. And it's gonna be awesome it's
gonna be like a garden inside on the ground floor and then it's gonna be sort
of going up into like this beautiful teal. Oh that's beautiful. Amazing. So I've done all the mood boards and as you know I love them. So I've got my favourite bit done now I've got to do all the hard work. So yeah I'm just
loads of different things and project managing a little cafe in Litchfield
designed it about two years ago and it's still going on. It's usually the way isn't it?
Nearly finished but the list we're doing is a listed building so it's taking ages. And yeah I've got a residential in Mersey. Oh amazing. She's lovely. I just got um so I think I might have
mentioned in previous episodes that I was helping out a friend with their
extension and so it's all done and they're officially moved back in so I
popped around there a couple of days ago just to kind of see you know to see it
kind of in all its glory. Is it all finished? Completely done? Yeah pretty much yeah yeah and they've got you know they're starting to put all their furniture back in and all of their pictures going back up on the walls and it just makes like it yeah it just makes my heart like I just feel really proud. I'm just really proud of it and they love it and it's just nice it's so nice when a project takes you know I mean they've been that build's been going on for a
year but the actual project's probably been bubbling for a good couple of
years I've been involved with it with them and it's just so nice to get in and
see you know their stamp on it and all of their stuff going back in and just how
happy they are being in there you know like using the kitchen using the space
how it was supposed to be used and it just makes me so happy. It makes me
really really happy. You should be really proud. Yeah that's cool it's really cool. Cool so yeah so we're gonna go and get James.
Yes and let's learn about some upholstery and some Sunbury fabrics. Let's do it.
So hello James. Hello Hayley how are you? Welcome to the interior design podcast. Thank you.
Delighted to be on. How are you? I'm good. I'm good. Disappointed about how wet the
summer's been. Very depressing but yeah I'm good I'm good. In my quiet month August is
always quiet for us so it's perfect time for me to come along. Everyone's on holiday aren't they? I know and also the mills shut down.
All the supplies are closed so it's a very quiet month for us. So this is a welcome break for the monotony.
Welcome welcome. Thank you for having me I'm really excited. So have you been on holiday this year? Not yet.
I'm going in two weeks three weeks for my anniversary first anniversary to Italy for three nights which would be lovely and then it's my dad's 60th and he's taking us all to Portugal for a week.
Oh wow. All eight of us. Thanks dad. With couples yeah yeah first family holiday in a while so we'll see how that goes.
Which would be nice yeah but apart from that no no not yet not yet not luxury not leisure anyway.
James so James hello. Hello Hayley. What are you going to educate designers about today?
Oh so about fabrics I don't really think I should do anything more than fabrics I don't really know much else about I know what I sell.
So you work for Sunbury Fabrics? I work for Sunbury Design yes. Sunbury Design. Did it used to be called Sunbury Fabrics? No it was called Lewis & Co Fabrics Limited which is still our official name and then we were called Sunbury Fabrics as well Lewis & Co Sunbury Fabrics.
So we started in 1947 1948 I should say and the building it was in was called Sunbury House which is why the Sunbury name comes from and then we switched to Sunbury Design before I worked before I worked for the company about 15 10 15 years ago.
Have you worked for the company for 15 years? No I've worked for the company seven years. I was going to say I'm the bottom of the world.
No no no you were my first ever call though. Really? Did you know that? No way. I remember yes. I was you my first ever ever visit as a customer. Oh my god. Yeah and I left wanting to quit no.
That's when you did your like the supplier days do you remember? Yeah I used to have a whole day. The whole supplier days I had like an hour. Back to back. Yeah.
But I do remember you ordering me loads of samples. Oh this job is easy. All these designers they love it and it's not always that easy. But no so I worked for seven years and yeah we changed we changed to Sunbury Design about 10 15 years ago because it sounds more in keeping with the market we work in.
And we work with the hospitality design industry so the Sunbury Design part is where it comes from. So yes. It's very niche. What the fabric world. Yeah.
The hospitality design industry is quite niche. There are lots of different regulations and something you don't really think about until you work in it. It's you don't really think about the chairs you sit on until you work in that industry or the curtain in your hotel room for example until later.
And then all the regulations and all sorts of things. So you just before you came on when you were saying I was saying to you we want to teach interior design interior design is something and like a little bit like a CPD. Yeah.
And you were like no we don't call it CPD we call it lunch and learn. Yeah. So I know in the workspace industry which we don't do loads in they do use them they do say you see CPD a lot more.
It's a car. Yeah it's more of an architect which is why it's got into the workspace environment because they do a lot of architectural stuff. But in the hospitality side it's generally lunch and learns.
That's what they call it. I guess it's less formal and it comes over from the states because in the states they do big things on lunch and learns they love a lunch and learn out there which is and obviously we follow we follow America.
Generally you pay 500 pounds 500 dollars which is basically 500 quid now isn't it. So yeah when I go out to the states and host lunch and learns there there are you have to the big design agencies or big cruise liners who we work with they they have approved
suppliers. So you can only work with these suppliers and it's generally around 500 dollars. Yeah. So it's cool. It's good fun.
It's tiring but it's very very good. I go I've started since covid I didn't really go before covid since in the last 18 months I've gone four or five times for work. I'm going again in October.
Yeah it's fun. But you're not on your own not with your family. It can be a bit it can be a bit lonely but every day is different.
You're not sitting in an office all day. It is a perk of the job. It is a perk of the job. So what are you going to teach into design. So I will talk about the regulations of fabrics.
So durability fire rating you need those sort of things really.
Yeah. Well try and teach you James. OK. Do you teach us. So with hospitality fabrics which is what our bag is in every poultry fabric has to be something called Crip 5 which is the fire rating.
It ensures the fabric is durable enough and has back coating on it that stops the fire from spreading sufficiently and you need that in a hospitality environment because of when there's kitchens and things like that and more people.
So those are that's the legal requirement for that. So just just to explain. So BS 5 8 5 2. Yeah. Is sick called cigarette and cigarette and match which is domestic.
So for domestic fabrics you only need cigarette and match. But for hospitality you need Crip 5.
Two different tests. Cigarette matches a cigarette and a match test in a lab. And then a Crip 5 test is a tiny little wooden crib. Do my job for me. Correct. Sorry darling.
No. Excellent. You're saying it much better than I am. But that's basically what happens. Yeah. Yeah. So they are two completely different tests. Generally Crip 5 is obviously higher than cigarette match.
So you don't. It is accepted in this in the domestic world as well. So if your stuff is Crip 5 it can also be used in the domestic environment. But if your stuff is not Crip 5 and it's only cigarette match you have to get it treated up.
Which is why. And you need that from a building control perspective. Yeah. So yeah. Legality. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I mean things have got a lot tighter since Grenfell as well.
I mean we only ever supplied Crip 5 cut stuff anyway. But I think the industry has got much stricter since then. The fire.
The fire. There's fire officers are much hotter on it. Quite rightly obviously. But yeah everything we supply is Crip 5 as standard. It's not a mark because it's not worth us. It's quite costly to stock two different types of things.
So we can still supply into the domestic market which is originally what the company used to do. We used to do home stuff. But the domestic the contract market is our main bag.
About 85 percent of it. Yeah. And then rub tests. Yes. Do you have any questions about rub tests before I begin on that. There's Martindale. Is there another one. So Martindale is the UK standard which is basically put on a machine and it goes up and down up and down.
Is it not a figure eight. That is the Wiesenbeck which is what they use in America. They call them Wiesenbeck. That's the figure of eight. Martindale is the backwards and forwards backwards and forwards. And each Martindale stroke is like forwards and back. Is it forwards and back is one rub.
Oh that's a good question actually. I believe so. Yes. Yes. And it will go with a textured weave. It will it will fail. The rub test will end when three when three break three weaves break. So I mean don't have a camera here.
But if you see our key book there that makes 45000 rubs. Go back and forth and when three go that is when the fabric has. OK. Well not failed but that is the end of the rub test.
With plainer fabrics it's a little tougher to see when it loses color. It starts to this this noticeable signs where which is why plain fabrics generally have a high rub test than textured fabrics because there's less wrong rest for the fabrics go wrong.
So but the severe contract minimum use is 40000 rubs. But generally in our industry you don't we don't generally sell stuff less than 45000 and even now it's getting higher and higher and higher. We sell things.
250. So we sell three four products three products 250000. I think also that you know when people think of rub count I mean you instantly think of you know the design industry you think of rub count as being when the product when the when the fabric fails
and breaks. But actually as you just pointed out with some of the plainer less heavy with fabrics it isn't just about the product failing. It's about loss of color.
The kind of the stretch. The wear and tear and things. Yeah which yeah. I think I mean I think it's such an important point that rub counts on fabrics because I think a lot of people a lot of designers maybe don't give it the thought that it actually really needs.
So it is important. I think they can be a bit misleading at times because stuff can be 40000 rubs and that is absolutely fine. It's like more than fine and it will perform just as well potentially as a quarter of a million rub tests and also you know if you're in a hotel or a restaurant it's getting refurbed.
If it's a high volume place it's getting refurbed fairly regularly so there's not even enough time for that fabric to even get to the point where it fails. But that's something that needs to be considered when selecting the right fabric for the job in terms of what that life cycle and the design is in terms of okay well you know how long are we talking before potentially there's a.
And where it's being used if you're using it on a if using it on a seat pad that's obviously going to get far more use than a back of a chair back of a chair could literally last forever. Especially on the outer back. It's never it's never going to get any sort of it might get if it's in a restaurant I guess you might people like rubbing their hands on it or wiping.
Yeah or maybe a way to spill a drink over or something like that but that's the worst it's ever going to get obviously a seat pad takes a lot more sort of abuse not abuse just durability yeah more wear so you've got to consider that which is why generally designers like yourselves will go for forever on the seat pad and then the decorative on the back.
I don't use it because a lot of the decorative fabrics you can get are 30 40 thousand and actually putting that on the back of a chair is fine.
Really cool designs and aren't very high. You kind of go I want to use that but actually if I just put it on the back it'll be fine. Yeah, yeah, because it's not getting anything there's nothing going to happen to it that's going to cause it to fail.
Yeah, as I said the only thing that's going to work it might get stained and as long as it's cleaned properly, which is always an issue, then you're not going to have a problem. Yeah, so that's that the late the more important thing that's arisen in the last few years is everything we supplied nearly now has some sort of stain resistant finish on them.
Because of the requirements in the industry they want their owners, you know, end users not even you guys is the your clients want their stuff to be easy to clean. You know what I've got a perfect example of that yesterday and it was one of your fabrics actually.
Excellent. I can't remember which one it was it was one of the velvets. Madison. Madison, probably. Did you send me a Madison recently? Yeah everyone loves Madison so yeah yeah yeah yeah.
And the client threw a glass of wine over the table. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, and it bubbled on the top right. Well, I don't know what happened initially, but after a little while, it just disappeared. Yeah, so that's what I was like this is amazing.
He was like really worried about it. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, and he did and he was like no, that's fine. So that's an example it's got stain resistant finish on it so the it will just bubble on the top. Although again, you don't necessarily need any sort of stain resistance on polyester fabrics because polyester isn't designed to be cleaned really easily.
In reality, it will be fine with just a cloth and soapy water, but they I suppose clients want that extra security that extra knowledge, so you've got to make it essentially bomb proof. Yeah, not bomb proof because we can't protect against bombs.
But hopefully, yeah, yeah, we'll let you know. Interesting story about that. We, you know, when there's a Salisbury poisonings. You remember the, yeah, yeah, yeah, the poisonings in Salisbury. So they put a photo on the restaurant it happened in and one of the in the photo was one of our fabrics, and I was like, do we are we against nuclear waste?
Can we protect against nuclear waste? Yeah, so I don't know if that was the answer. I'm sure I'm sure they removed that fabric. I would have advised them to remove that. Yeah.
So yeah, that's a very important point any sort of stain resistance. Our sort of revolutionary one was our AquaClean, which is one of which is one of these with the coolest thing about the AquaClean was that it is the stain resistance is built into the yarn of the fabric.
So a lot, the majority of our products that have the stain resistance, it's made, it's added after the fabric is made. So the fabric is what is woven and then applied over.
And then, yeah, yeah, exactly. Whereas on AquaClean, are you saying that the weave itself is treated? Yeah, the yarn. Yeah, the treatment, the technologies is injected into the yarn in effect. And that's what's so revolutionary about it.
And what's great about it, you only need to clean it with cloth and water. So it'll take out by row. It'll take out coffee or take out ketchup or even take out European Sharpie.
I think the most famous brand of like coating is like Teflon. Teflon. Yeah, and Scotchgard. Yeah. How does that compare to those kind of things?
Well, AquaClean is the fact it's not a coating. That's the beauty of it. So Scotchgard and Teflon are coatings on top. Yeah, which are great. They perform brilliantly. A good amount better.
It's part of the fabric. So whereas they, I mean, not now, I mean, much more, you know, more modern versions of these stuff last a lot longer.
But, you know, the idea with the fabric, it won't go wear off because it's part of the fabric. It is literally in the yarn of the fabric and it's very green because you need to clean it with water. There's no other chemicals needed to clean it with.
And yeah, it takes out by row, which is really cool. So we do exhibitions. You've seen my trick. You can you get people to draw their name on. We get bring a sample people write their name in by row and we can take it out with a cloth and water.
So it's a it was a real revolutionary thing in the market. I didn't. We launched it just before I started. But, you know, we were getting orders left, right and center. And even now, our Napa range, which is everywhere.
Yeah, everyone loves Napa. It's still our second off the bestseller and it's been out for 10, 10 years plus. It's just constantly. And that's called Vermillion Rubs actually. So that's the that's your faux leather, isn't it?
No, it's like a faux suede. Oh, I know. I know. Yeah. It's like a bobble effect. Where is it? There you go. And you had seen it. Oh, yeah. Yeah. So it's it's beautiful. It's a beautiful range.
I specify some of that on Forest Holidays. Yes, I do. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And yeah, I mean, I went into a care home a few weeks ago and they had it on everything. Yeah. Yeah.
And it's just it's a really durable fabric. It will last forever.
It's really authentic as well. Yeah. Yeah. I think that's the nice thing about I think the Sunbury range is that they're, you know, on things like this faux suede and the faux leathers, they're, they're you can't really, I mean, really, you can't tell the difference, can you?
No, I mean, we do sell leather as well, but people don't mean people just don't buy leather as much as they used to anyway. So that's where our faux leathers and our faux suede come in a lot more.
And so on the Nappa and some of your other products, the AquaClean isn't across the board on your range.
No, we have nine ranges where we have AquaClean. There's more coming out. Well, one's coming out very soon, then potentially two or three more coming out next year.
No, it's not one because it's one supplier. You don't you never want to be tied to one supplier because it's always a risk for a business. You spread, you spread your risk really.
And a lot, you know, every supplier has offered something different. So AquaClean obviously is fantastic. They produce great products and it's one of our better probably mill we do the most with.
But then we've got our Madison where we that that mill we supply who supply all of our recycled fabrics from.
I've written recycled. We are bringing out a recycled AquaClean soon as well. So yeah, watch this space should be cool.
Yeah, I can see that. We're going to get a little tag soon, which will make it clearer that it's recycled.
So that, yeah, so just the color of the holder. If you change that to a green or something.
So, yeah, we like something we can look into to make it clearer what it is. So, yeah, recycled products are becoming much more of a thing in the industry.
I don't know if you get asked it by clients a lot. Well, we touched on this a couple of weeks ago when we had Lewis in didn't we from Grower?
We were talking he was talking about kind of cradle to cradle with the Grower product. You know, it's important, I think.
And more and more people just becoming very aware of it as they should be. Yeah, absolutely.
Yeah, I mean, so we only offer the recycled element right now.
It's very difficult to have a recyclable contract fabric once you upholster it and it's put on the phone and all of that.
Stuck with glue. Yeah, yeah. And the product's being treated. Yeah. You know, there's that, I guess. Yeah.
So, yes, exactly. I mean, we've tried to eliminate as many sort of negative elements of the fabric, even with recycled.
So, I mean, it's collected from plastic bottles and normally near ocean waste by a brand. It's a brand called Reprieve.
Reprieve is a huge American brand. If you go on their website, you'll see their main market is clothing.
But they also now ventured into sort of upholstery and curtain fabric as well.
And I mean, their clients, people like Nike, everyone, you probably have some clothing, which is Reprieve.
And then so they collect it anyway. So it's turned into the polyester fabric that we then supply to you guys.
So Reprieve, do they collect stuff from the ocean? If you go on their website, it's R-E-P-R-E-V-E.
It's around the ocean, around ocean waste. It's really, really cool.
And actually on their website, you'll see they've got like a countdown of how many bottles they're recycling at one time.
Really, really cool. And then so then that's what you get out of our products.
But then we've also gone that little bit step further.
We've made sure the crib five element of the fabric is halogen free.
And halogen is like a chemical which is generally has been used to make things crib five because you can stick it on the fabric and it doesn't burn to 2000 degrees.
It's cheap, very, very good and very, very obviously fire retardant, but it's not particularly good for the environment.
So we've removed that, but we still made it crib five.
Our stain resistant treatment on it doesn't have any purofluoride carbons in it.
What is a purofluoride carbon?
So it's like a colourless, it's a colourless chemical.
It's not flammable, which is why again it's used in on soil and stain treatments in fabric, but it's not very good for the environment.
And so it's very good. It's very quick. It's very reactive to taking out stains.
So we've removed that and we've still got the stain resistant finish on them.
So that's where we're going and we'll add it to eventually to all of our other products as well.
So that's the main thing.
Recycled products at the moment are slightly more expensive because there's not the high demand for it as there is for normal ones.
But I'd imagine in the next five to ten years recycled elements will be like what crib five is now or what 40,000 rubs is now.
It will be a requirement in the industry.
There has to be some sort of recycle element.
There's no virgin yarn in your fabric or not not not not 100 percent virgin yarn.
I'm sure there will be a requirement. It's going to be 30 or 40 percent recycled.
And rightly so, I think as the world burns, we've got to do something.
We've got to. So, yeah, we'll try to do a little a little steps.
It's very difficult because then you don't always know what happens.
I mean, for fabric suppliers, for furniture manufacturers, for designers, you don't know what's going to happen to the rest.
So, I think the chairs in that restaurant or the headboards in that hotel after five, six years, are the owners just going to get rid of it all and put in a skip and send it to landfill?
You sort of lose that control over it.
So, I guess they'll have to be bigger regulations, maybe on like the people with the real money, which are the owners, the people, the hotel owners and the restaurant owners who will have to recycle things a lot better.
I think that there's a lot of there's a lot of trouble reusing old furniture and reusing, including the upholstery, even if the upholstery is very good.
Which is also very expensive. It's very like that's always the problem that comes across people, even on the domestic side, you can you've got your old sofa.
It's cheaper to bin it and go and buy a new one.
So, yeah, I can't go into the actual pricing is, but that soars down the velvet you were looking at.
That's a decently priced velvet.
It's what it is, but it's six pounds a meter more than our Madison velvet, which is our bestseller and not recycled.
And we can offer Madison in a recycled element now for 300 meter minimums, but that the price would then increase.
But I think it's already it's already sort of starting to merge.
And there's not too much difference now between the old to between I think and I think in two or three years, I don't I think it'll be very it'll be negligible.
Yeah, more people use it.
So, you know, there's less expense buying buying the actual yarn for the mills and things like that.
I think that there is some onus on upholsterers to label the furniture really, really well and because I think that there's a there's a labeling system in domestic where you have to have a label.
Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, you have to have the commercial don't necessarily.
Yeah, that's a good point, actually.
And actually, if upholsterers and manufacturers were just to put something permanent on the bottom of a chair, saying this is crib five, I'm surprised there's not there's not that requirement when you think it's going to be in a home.
Yeah, I've seen so much furniture in pubs and restaurants.
I mean, I know it's group five because it's like in seats either our fabric or a competitor of ours fabric who only do group five as well. So you know it's group five.
But yeah, how does actually know when you're when you're recycling something if you're selling chairs that are upholstered, you have to make sure that they are compliant.
And if there's no label, no, it's tricky on the chair that's permanent fixture.
You have you don't know you can't prove it.
So you therefore have to re upholster it and then you have to throw it away.
Absolutely. I think that there is an onus on upholsterers to make sure things are labeled really well.
So then if you have got a chair that's not worn out and it's the right color, you don't have to re upholster it and you can just use it.
Yeah, absolutely.
No, I agree completely.
It's really valid. Really valid, I think.
Yeah, but yeah, no, you're right. It's budget still dictates everything, especially now, in fact, with the cost of living crisis and, you know, energy bills have dropped thankfully in the last few months.
But generally energy bills, budgets are tighter than they were.
Kinds don't have the money to spend interest rates, they don't have the money to spend. They did. Well, I don't know. Pre war, pre COVID, you know, pre everything before the world went crazy.
So everything has changed. Yeah, I mean, the our pricing structure has changed.
Everything has risen. Our cheap fabric is now what our our cheap costing fabric is now what our medium to high costing fabric used to be.
It is and it also plot, you know, it's not just our self compared I speak to our competitors, we're all in the same boat. It is what it is.
People have people are slowly accepting they've got to pay more now.
They still get some people don't understand the pricing, but that is what it is, I'm afraid.
I'm hoping it's going to level out now.
So last year we had four price increases in a year. Normally we have one to two max this year we've only had one, and this doesn't seem to be any on the board, just yet. So I hope so, because it's a nightmare, especially as someone trying to sell a fabric, I give a price, and then two or three months later that price is invalid.
Where in the past we might have been able to maintain our previous price where last year we just couldn't. If our suppliers put their product price up 10 15%, we're not making any money if we don't sell it on the right price. Same as you guys though with what you're charging for your design work.
You know, if you're, you know, everything's costing more. Yeah, a lot more.
So we're going to go for a little break now.
See you after the break.
My big, my big smile is bloody driving.
Yeah.
Which, my mileage, 85,000 miles I've done in my car.
I love driving.
We'll all be automated soon, won't it? We'll be driverless cars. Oh my god I can't wait until I can have a driverless car and do some work while I'm in the car. I feel like I'm wasting my time when I drive, I always get the train.
It's so tiring as well. Like, concentrating on the driving, but once it becomes driverless, I think I'll be a while off.
I feel like sitting on a train, won't it? Yeah, my car is in the motorway actually can be almost driverless. I can put it in cruise control and I can put it in lane control. So it'll stay in the lane. But if you take your hand off the wheel after like three or four seconds, it has a shit fit.
What are you doing?
What are you doing, what you're doing. So you've got to like keep your hand low.
What's a RAV4?
Toyota.
I don't know how I feel about driverless cars. I'm very old school.
Why?
I'm just really old school.
I just been away in this course recently, Naughty Driver's Course, and they told us 97% or something ridiculously high like that of crashes are down to driver error.
Oh God, when we're driving in a driverless car.
So when you think about that, when you think about that, how much safer and you'll get to places quicker because generally traffic is caused by idiots, I would say.
Because there's crashes.
Yeah, because there's crashes. You don't agree.
I disagree.
You're against the new world, are you?
I am.
Yeah, I am. I don't like it.
One thing I wouldn't do, I couldn't imagine getting on a pilotless plane. That would freak me out a bit.
Well you wouldn't do really because they've got all these pilots.
I know, I know, but they literally are. But there's like the comfort of knowing if shit hits the fan, they're there.
Do you know what I mean? I'm not a great flyer.
No, I'm not a great flyer.
Which is not great considering how much flying I do for my job.
So when we went to France a couple of weeks ago with Thea, my daughter's eight.
Did you drive?
No, we flew and then picked up her car at the airport and drove.
And she said to me on the flight, literally we're about to take off, and she went, I think today's going to be the day.
I was like, what day? For what? She was like, well they have to use the slides.
And I was like, Thea, don't say shit like that. And I was like, I mean it is Ryanair.
Also, they charge for everything. If you have to get on the slide, they're charging you 50 quid per person to get out.
That's an extra.
Also, did she realise the slide doesn't go down 35,000 feet?
And I'm not a good flyer, so I was like, I managed to talk her down, it was fine.
When I went travelling before I joined Sunbury, I went backpacking for three or four months, I was flying to Australia.
The stop was in Singapore and we went through, it must have been a storm or something.
It was going to be two of the worst hours of my life. We were banging and it was just like...
Awful.
And I was on my own. I was like, oh my God, I'm going to die on my own, surrounded by strangers.
But I got there safe and sound.
You made it.
I was obviously being very dramatic.
I find it easier flying on my own.
I get really bored. I have to have something to distract me.
When I was in my twenties, we used to go to China and Asia a lot.
When I used to work for my dad.
Did I know you then?
No, you knew my dad, you knew Ben as well, right?
And Ben.
And Ben, but you didn't know me.
You used to go to China, is that where you got most of your stuff?
Most of the stuff came from Asia.
We did import from Italy and Romania as well, but a lot of it came from China.
I was out there two or three times a year.
We used to do March, we used to do all the trade fairs.
We used to do every year 14 flights in three weeks.
Every single flight I got on, I went, I'm upping the odds.
And we used to get on China Air, which is a shit air.
Have you ever been on China?
No, it's funny, sorry about Australia, when I went to Australia.
So I went, I went and met two of my friends who were traveling already.
They'd been there for a year and then six of our other friends all came out and met us for three weeks.
And we went up to Coastal Australia, which is really great trip.
But they all flew China Southern and they just said it was like flying Ryanair 18 hours.
I flew Singapore Air, which is great.
Amazing.
Not in economy, obviously, but it was still better than China Southern.
Oh man, the China Air though, oh my God.
We were sat on a runway with all these Chinese people.
And you know the culture in Chinese.
It's funny that.
Genius.
Actually, they were all English.
But the culture in Chinese is to be quite shouty.
Like people get really shouty and they're not necessarily being aggressive.
They're just shouting.
I come from a shouty family.
I'm Jewish, so we also shout a lot.
Similar culture, clearly.
But we were sat on this plane and we were on the runway for about two hours.
And all of these guys were getting really irate.
And there was just like this, the noise level just was going up and up and up.
And there was this like shitty plane.
It was all rickety and it was like creaking.
Oh my God.
Leah and my dad were sitting there going, oh my God, what's going to happen?
And you've got two hours to think about what's going to happen.
Well, from like a one hour flight probably, wasn't it or something?
I can't remember.
I was just trying to think of such a big country.
Oh man.
Shall we talk about fabric?
I don't know, I quite like the traveling vibe.
It's a bit more interesting, isn't it?
Fabric's great.
I can talk about fabric all day long, which I do, clearly.
So trends, what have you guys from a design perspective noticed from trends in the market?
Fabric trends.
Because interesting what we picked up.
I love this question.
Prepare us for that one.
I know.
I'm sort of reversing it.
Fabric trends.
Oh, I'm stumped.
Obviously velvet has been like back in for a very, very long time now.
We sell so much velvet.
Yeah, I use a lot of velvet.
Yeah, exactly.
Plain velvet.
But then boot clay has been like the new sort of.
Yeah.
It's like a bobbly type.
It's quite retro.
It's a Scandinavian type thing.
That?
Yes, sort of, but not really.
A bit more than that.
That's a bit too smooth.
We've got a boot clay.
So I need to put a link in the notes on the show.
We've got a boot clay.
Put the link to our Leopold boot clay.
Okay.
Collection.
Leopold boot clay collection.
It's a recycled boot clay.
Oh nice.
It's cool, right?
How do you spell boot clay?
B-O-U-C-L-E.
E?
Yes.
Tell my mother's an English teacher.
Oh, I hate autocorrect.
B-O-U-C-L-E.
Yeah.
Link in notes.
Link in the description.
Note to self.
Ask James.
Order samples.
Get book.
Order fabric.
Specify, specify, specify.
See, it rolls with the time.
So trends boot clay.
Boot clay's been, yeah, I mean, it's sort of, it's been a bit of a
challenge, but it's been a bit of a challenge, but it's been a bit of a challenge.
So trends boot clay.
Boot clay's been, yeah, I mean, it's not just us.
I mean, all of our competitors.
I saw someone put on the other day on LinkedIn, I'm looking for a fabric company that doesn't
have any boot clay because we all have one.
It's all, but it's the trend and everyone wants one.
So, and then it's about us trying to offer, yeah, slightly different colors to what our
competitors offer and then trying to do the same thing.
But, and having the right stock and things like that.
And then you can put it on the trend and the trend can be done by the time you launch the
product.
So I was going to say, when you kind of asked that question, I was thinking, oh my God,
Cheryl, if something's on trend, I try and avoid it.
Well, do you remember?
At all costs.
That's because you're a trendsetter.
Trendsetter.
Oh, I don't know about that.
Cheryl, the trendsetter.
I think I try, if someone says, oh, I really want to.
So like the big thing before I started at Sunbury, I remember it was just, it was just
ending, because when I first started on the job, people asked me if we offered it, was
Hound, the Houndstooth design.
That was, I know it was massive before we started, we never offered it.
And by the time I, within like six months to a year of me starting, no one was asking
for it anymore.
It like completely sort of like died a death.
But for a time it was like the next big thing.
And then we had like the polka dot spots, do you remember that?
That was really in at one point.
We had that all on Costa Coffee.
But again, that's all sort of died a death now.
It's hard with designs, why we don't offer loads of patterns, because they're more expensive
to produce.
People generally will only use them once.
And then you don't get the volume you get out of them on planes.
So it's where you, what you're sitting on there, that back of that chair, it's not ours, it's
a competitor of ours.
I won't say who it is, but I do know who it is.
It looks a bit like your Kiko range.
Exactly.
It looks like our Kiko range.
That textured weave is very much in.
We've got one of our recycle products like that called Zonda, which I think I showed you
before, very similar.
The texture, that textured weave feels like the next big, is where people like to go because
they don't want completely pain, but they're scared of going for pattern.
So I feel like.
I think that the planes just have a bit more longevity, don't they?
A plane valve also, someone had someone, a big cruise line explained to me why they like
going for planes, because if they buy a plane from us for a ship for three or four years,
and then they want to refurb it, part of it, and we don't have that plane anymore, they
know we will either have an identical replacement or someone else will have something that's
identical.
So they don't have to worry then about refurbing the whole ship and causing an accident, causing
costing fortunes.
So it's much safer.
It's a much safer bet.
Patterns are more fashionable.
So the, for example, I've just specified a plane on your velvet.
Yeah, the saw is down.
A plain green and then we've put a really beautiful pattern.
It's got loads of leaves and pigeons in it.
And we've done that on the curtains and on the cushions.
So the curtains and the cushions can be whipped off in two or three years when that's not
in fashion anymore.
And that's what the client has asked for.
And it doesn't cost them a fortune to replace it.
Yeah, exactly.
Or like, you know, if you're doing it on chairs, for us, if a chair breaks or three or four
chairs break and you need, and we don't have that plane fabric anymore, it's fine.
We'll probably have something identical to it.
Or something that would compliment it.
Something that would compliment it.
Whereas if you've done it all in patterns, you're sort of fucked because you've got
to replace the whole thing with a brand new pattern and everything's much more expensive.
And from a designer's point of view.
So your client isn't happy with you either, I assume.
If you're costing them more money.
And from a design perspective, you would maybe do plain, plain, plain pattern, like pop of colour.
Yeah, pop of colour.
You wouldn't generally do...
No, exactly.
Which is why we've also gone into...
Maximalism everywhere, would you?
Yeah, I was going to say, yeah.
That's why we've also started offering our prints as well, because prints have that pattern
and are much cheaper to produce than cut velvet patterns.
Because it's just a general print on a base cloth.
And if you've seen that, we've collaborated with a textile designer called Amelia Graham.
So we've launched two ranges.
LinkedIn notes.
LinkedIn Amelia stuff is really cool.
She obviously has our fabrics, but she does scarves and things like that.
And she's really nice as well.
What's her name?
Amelia Graham.
She's based in Brighton.
A-M-A-E.
A-M-E-L-I-A.
She is...
So we've collaborated on two products with her.
One was called Perception, which we launched annoyingly January 2020.
So it had a really good initial reception and then COVID sort of just killed that vibe.
But it's still doing really well.
It's been expecting some really cool jobs.
And then we launched the second one last year, which was on a recycled base cloth called Cascade.
The cool thing is now we can print any design on a recycled base cloth, which is really, really cool.
It gives good options for big projects.
It's about 100 meters minimum.
So if we wanted to design a fabric...
Design a fabric, yeah.
You can print it for us.
We can print it.
As long as you provide... we always say you've got to provide the artwork as designers.
We don't do the artwork.
We're not artists.
And it's about 100 meter minimums.
So it's not...
So obviously, if you're just doing it for a back of a chair, it wouldn't be ideal.
But if you want to do like a hotel curtains or like in bedroom chairs at a hotel, that's plenty for it as an example.
So on the stuff that you...
So on the printed patterns that you do, if you...
I don't know whether people want to know about this, but I'm intrigued to know whether...
Do you...
So you said there was a fabric called... what was it called?
Not Inception.
Perception.
Perception's a good name though.
I might suggest that in our next creative meeting.
Perception.
So you come up with an idea.
Yeah.
And then do you pitch that to designers or does she come to you with...
So our design director, a guy called Ben Earing.
Have you met Ben Earing?
Is Ben your cousin?
No, no, no.
Ben Lewis is my cousin.
We've got another Ben.
That's amazing.
Who is the design director.
And his dad was a former sales director at Sunbury, but he's not a Lewis.
But he's very...
Oh my God, he's not a Lewis.
He's an honorary Lewis.
He's probably the most important person in the business to be fair.
So he's the one that deals with...
Don't tell your dad that.
No, no, my dad agrees.
He deals with all the mills.
He's the one that's got all the...
If I've ever got an issue with a fabric, I'll call him.
He's got the knowledge that no one else...
He's worked in mills before as well.
So he's got encyclopedic knowledge of fabrics.
So he met... he found him and Amidia sort of connected on LinkedIn and they met and she was going through some conceptions of designs and that's how that got produced.
And then we spoke to our supplier who can do a base cloth in that and then we print the design onto that base cloth.
So it's pretty cool.
Pretty cool.
Lots of people are doing it now.
It's a good version of... a good way of getting color, getting design without it being too costly to us or the end user as well.
It's significantly cheaper than a cut velvet, for example.
And much... we don't have to stock loads of it.
And then you don't get left with loads of stock once it goes off and out of trend, which is always a problem.
It's the risk everyone takes, I guess.
So yeah, that's a pretty...
But interesting to know that from a design point of view, if there was a design, you know, if there was an interior designer working on a project that needed something that was completely bespoke, if they were in a position to either design it themselves or have someone as an artist do the design for them.
And they can approach you guys at Sumbree and say, you know, this is what we need.
These are the quantities that we need.
Is it something that you're interested in?
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
The only thing we don't do is the design ourselves because we're not designers.
But yeah, if they gave us the design in an image, in a high resolution image, there's no reason why we can't do it.
I always think when you're doing... because we do branding and interior design.
I always think when you're doing branding, it's really... if you're doing branding for a hotel or for like a hospitality venue, it's always really cool to have a pattern.
I agree completely.
And as part of the branding, I always offer that because having that pattern...
It makes it pop.
Yeah.
It gives you brand consistency.
And it elevates the brand, doesn't it?
I mean, it's definitely high end, isn't it?
It's kind of the luxury end of the market to be able to integrate that branding somehow into...
Not just from a color perspective, but it could be really clever with you though.
I don't think it needs to be expensive though because it doesn't have to be high end.
It's a bit like Costa.
Costa have got their brand sorted.
Their interior fit-outs aren't that expensive.
But Costa are constantly evolving.
And they're constantly changing.
Because we've been on Costa projects for like 10, 15 years and sometimes we get more out of them than not.
Sometimes we get loads out of them, but they're constantly changing how they do things because they know they've got to evolve as a brand.
It's really interesting.
Obviously they're owned by Coca-Cola now.
They got bought out.
Did the whole of Whitbreads get bought out by Costa?
No, no.
They just bought part of Costa from Whitbreads.
But Whitbreads still own Premier Inn and things like that.
But yeah, I think Whitbreads bought them.
Correct me if I'm wrong.
You can look it up online, listeners.
I think they bought it for like 17 million or something.
And they sold it to Coke for like four billion.
But they did so much though because they went into all the Costa garages and got those Costa Expresses and stuff.
I mean it's genius.
It's a great idea.
I would say it's a bigger brand in the UK than Starbucks is probably.
Starbucks is like the go-to brand in America.
But here you've got Costa, you've got Pret as well, which is obviously more of a city type coffee place.
But coffee here is massive, right?
We were talking about before.
There's so many.
You've got Costa, I mean the Bain too, Costa Pret.
Then you've also got Costa Pret, Starbucks.
Then you've got Nero, which is really nice.
Nero is pretty big.
I like Nero. Nero is really good.
Then you've got Tim Hultons, which is getting bigger.
But that's...
That's not coffee though, is it?
Yeah, it's coffee.
It's like the Starbucks of Canada almost.
Oh.
Yeah.
There's quite a bit of fabric in that as well in the UK, but it's massive.
So that's huge.
And then you've got smaller ones, as we were saying, in the UK.
They're obviously massive in America and things like that.
Then you've got Dunkin Donuts here, I think.
You had that in America?
Oh my gosh.
Bang on that.
We've got Krispy Kremes.
Yeah.
They're not drive-through.
No, there is one.
There is one Krispy Kreme.
Is there?
Yeah, yeah.
There's one Krispy Kreme drive-through in Enfield.
Not quite far for you.
Not far for me at all.
It's about 10 minutes from my house.
It's too close.
You've not been in a while.
I might suggest it to her.
Yeah, no, it's about 10 minutes from my house.
But yeah, that's the next one.
We'll pitch it.
We'll pitch it to Dunkin.
Dunkin Donuts.
Get a mug over here.
We've got a Wendy's opening culture store.
Do you?
Apparently everyone keeps talking about it.
Oh, we took the kids to Wendy's and there was a massive queue.
Yeah, and there was a massive thing, I think, in the paper someone was telling me the other
day about everyone's up in arms about the fact that it's all cashless.
Oh.
Rightly so, people.
Do you know what?
The banks are just rinsing us, aren't they?
All the money is just going to the banks.
I'm not even going to get on my seatbelt for that.
I don't really carry cash, though.
I do.
Do you?
I can't keep using it.
It'll go.
It will go.
No.
Yeah, but every time you do a transaction, two and a half percent of that transaction
goes to the bank.
I know.
And then that money is reduced and then that person's going to pay someone else in something
and then two and a half percent of that.
By the time you've had ten transactions, all the money's gone to the bank.
I know.
It's just convenient, though.
Yeah, no, I know.
It's control, though, as well.
Don't forget.
Massive control.
Don't get us on our seat box.
Maybe we'll edit this out.
Yeah.
Head down the conspiracy theory about the whole.
Anarchy, let's go.
Yeah, we're not talking about that.
We're talking about fabrics.
We accept our fabrics in cash, by the way.
We take cash.
We take whatever you want.
I think we're in cash, actually.
So what else can you educate us about fabrics?
Oh, trends.
So I was going to say something about trends.
So in reply, so going back to trends, I think the sustainability has got a massive thing.
Oh, it's like.
And like green and natural fibers.
And I don't think that's going anywhere fast.
It's here to stay.
You know, we've got to, you know, the world is like everyone just look out the window,
not this summer, actually.
Generally, you know, the world is burning and we've got to I suppose, you know, alien
dates not really up to, you know, we can only do so much as people.
But, you know, when you're supplying and I think there's a responsibility to start to
supply things that has a sustainable element.
Absolutely.
The difficulty at the moment, though, with all of that is the fact that it's all people
have the choice.
Right.
Exactly.
They have the choice to either be.
I would say I think most people are do try and make some effort.
Some effort.
I don't think there's very few people who are completely like, fuck it, I don't care.
Basically, I think most people, you know, have a recycling bin at home, for example,
basics.
And so then that's why I think it then translate into the working environment.
A designer generally will like to look for recycled something that's got a sustainable
story to it.
It's also a nice story to sort of when you're selling it in, it looks good and it sounds
nice.
I think that the responsibility of designers is and I said this, I think in the cradle
to cradle one is designers have a responsibility to specify something that is and make sure
that they're offering a sustainable choice.
If even if it's more expensive, you go to the client, you say this is the sustainable
option, which I would prefer you to use.
And this is one that's cheaper if you need to work on the budget.
Or maybe a mixture of the two.
That's always maybe a good way to go.
But no, I agree.
I mean, I noticed when we first launched the recycle products, we had a good reception,
but there were some people like whatever.
But now, you know, we get asked, is it recycled?
And I'm showing the fabric and they're like, oh, it's recycled.
Really?
That's great.
It's good to know.
And it's just becoming such a thing now.
It's so important.
But in terms of trend, the actual perception that it's recycled.
That whole I think that kind of natural looking.
Yeah, absolutely.
It doesn't necessarily mean that it is recycled.
Hopefully it is.
Do you mean in colors?
Yes.
So like soft like greens and natural fibers.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Things like that are all really on trend at the moment.
It's interesting.
Yeah, I agree, actually.
I mean, that I mean, the problem with natural fibers are so expensive.
Wall is obviously very it is so natural.
It's a fortune.
You know, we wouldn't be able to.
If we launched a wall range, we'd sell it in some elements.
We would sell it, but not in any great, great quantities because it's so expensive.
We'd have to sell it significantly more than what we sell any product for, even our most
expensive product.
And it's not really the market we work in.
The high end residential market, I think that's got natural products have got a huge future,
like huge people, especially if you're building, if you're designing a house in like Chelsea
or even somewhere in the richer parts of the home counties.
You know, that's where natural fibers have a huge part to play.
Again, it's cost, isn't it?
It's cost.
But suppose if you've got a five, 10 million pound house, you can definitely afford to pay
an extra 20 quid a meter on your sofa.
I think.
Oh, God, yeah.
So when I sell my fabric, I'm designing my multi-million pound home and I got you girls
designing it.
Good man.
We'll do it.
The other thing about trends is which we touched on when we were talking about color, the
fact that and Cheryl, you said I don't like it when it's a trend.
Actually when you're designing, you shouldn't really be looking at a trend.
You should be looking at what are you trying to achieve if you if what you're trying to
do is attract all the people who liked to be trendy.
Is that a word?
Yeah, in on trend on trend on trend.
My grandma used to say that.
When you're trendy.
Trendy.
But in terms of you've got to look at the market that you're designing for the person
that you're designing for and tap that tap into that, not into the trend.
Is that is that where you were going with that earlier?
Because you don't like to do your designing.
Do you follow like color of the year?
You know, no, no, no, no.
Honestly, a massive, massive anarchist over here.
I'm burning down.
It's awful.
It's not awful.
It's not.
What I find interesting is we I mean, we don't get affected by the color of the year too
much because hospitality doesn't isn't as influenced as other markets are.
But it is funny that it's decided by a group of people what the color of the year is.
But why?
Why is it the color of the year?
We were talking about this when we were discussing psychology of color and we were when we've
had discussions about it after we spoke to Karen and you know, what came out of that
conversation was actually like color of the year, you're lost, it's great.
That's not that's not what it should be about.
And I think that's probably why I try and if there's a if there's something on trend
and it's very much on trend, I'm very conscious as a designer that that trend has got to me
at a point.
It's got shelf life and it's got a shelf life.
So actually, if the client comes to me and says, I've got a vision in mind of what I
want to try and create and I really love, for example, I don't know, I'm just trying
to think of antlers.
And I'm just thinking about something that would be really on trend necklace.
Boot clay, for example.
So if they were like, I love the boot clay and, you know, I kind of want to center it
around that or those kind of textures, I'd be thinking, well, boot clay is very on trend
now.
But that's you know, the only thing about boot clay is it's plain.
Right.
So it's got more of a shelf life than a particular type of pattern.
Yeah.
Has like like a houndstooth, dog's tooth, I should say, or or like a polka dot or something
like that or herringbone, which has a herringbone has been going for quite a while.
But can I just ask?
Sorry to change the subject.
You can change much.
Houndstooth, dog tooth.
What's why?
Well, I don't know why.
I mean, again, they call it dog tooth, houndstooth.
And was it first houndstooth or first dog tooth?
Oh, I don't know.
Bit of research here.
So you get you get all sorts of knowledge.
They say you learn something new every day.
No, it's fine.
Houndstooth.
Dog tooth.
Houndstooth.
I can't.
Yeah.
What came first, right?
We'll have to come back to that.
We'll put that in the notes, people.
I think from a trend point of view for me anyway, as a designer, I try and I'm constantly
trying to push the boundaries and I'm constantly trying to think outside the box.
And you know, maybe I'm playing the devil's advocate a little bit.
So if someone comes to me and says this is what I want to try and yeah, as a vision,
I won't just I won't just do as I'm told.
I'm not going to just take their vision and say, OK, well, that's what I'm going to design.
I'll be like, well, actually, if you thought about that, there's so much more to it than
that.
Have you thought about the context of the building, the context of your brand, the context
of your location, of everything?
It's interesting when you say think outside the box because we tried to, but we can't
take we as we can't be too different as fabric suppliers because if you launch something
that is very Marmite, you know, you're you can be left with quite a lot of stuff that
people hate, but it can also get huge.
And that is that gamble.
But is that gamble you take?
So it is interesting that I know you hear from designers, we want fabric suppliers,
we want you guys to do something different.
We want like, yeah, I know.
But there's a reason we don't all do loads of different stuff because we've all tried
it in the past and we've had stuff that's worked and hasn't worked.
Same as a lot of our competitors.
But the stuff that hasn't worked is like it's really shit because you're left with expensive,
very expensive, very expensive mistakes.
So you can't, you know, and the safer bet is always planes and textured planes.
It's always going to be and that's always what our volume will be.
But I get from you guys is pretty boring.
No, there's a place for it without a shadow of a doubt.
It's always the base of my design is I always go to your book.
Start with your planes and then work your way out.
Yeah.
Sensible.
Have a little break.
See you in a minute.
I feel like I'm going to get a reputation on this podcast of being an anarchist.
I'm going to be like, no, no, no.
It's all made up from the sky.
That's why I asked you to help me.
It's just polarizing opinions.
I like that.
It's not.
It's really fucking.
If someone said to me, I need boot clay, it's going in somewhere.
That's good.
I think there's a place for both of that.
I genuinely do.
I think there's a place for the tradition.
I'm looking at it and being like, that's why Haley's got loads of work on.
I'm like, right, I've got these two projects I'm working on at the moment.
No.
Not at all.
There's a place for both.
I agree.
I agree completely.
I wouldn't want to do.
I wouldn't want to change.
If you're a creative person, you can't really make something you're not passionate about,
I'd imagine.
Whereas I can sell a product I don't like or I don't think will do well.
I still sell it in the same way.
I sell a really good product, I guess.
I'm not like that.
You'll be all creative.
It's different.
Obviously, if I really like a product, I think it's going to do really well.
I guess it comes across that I really like it a lot more than if I didn't like it.
I like all of our products.
I used to sell shirts when I was at college.
I used to work in backers menswear.
I used to absolutely love it.
You used to work at the same culture store?
Yeah.
Still there.
Yeah, I know.
That was like 20 years ago.
That's insane.
25 years ago.
Oh my God, I'm sorry.
What was it?
Was it like a high-end store?
It's like an independent menswear.
It's still there.
It's quite rare, actually, that these independent shops are still there.
They taught me how to sell.
It was brilliant because I used to get men dressed.
Your dream, right?
I'm not sure about that.
I think it's the other way around.
Yeah, but she sees them get undressed and then dresses.
All of the shirts in the shop, my point was...
That you got to see the men undressed and dress them back up.
Would you like me to help you with that?
You got a problem taking that shirt off?
I'll do your cufflinks for you.
I'll help you.
All the shirts in the shop that I liked would sell out ridiculously quickly because I'd
be like, look at this one, it's amazing.
Then all the ones I didn't like never used to sell, so they used to get me involved.
I was their best Saturday girl.
Well, yeah, maybe come work for us.
Still today, I go in there and they go, yeah, this is Haley.
She was our best ever Saturday girl.
Maybe you can come and take my job.
Sell better than me.
I like my job.
Yeah, I like my job.
It's a good industry to work in, isn't it?
Oh, yes.
We were going to talk about the industry, weren't we?
Segway, Segway.
That's a good segue because you worked in it for a long time, haven't you?
It's a very sociable industry.
There's lots of networking events.
It's good fun.
The type of selling you do isn't hard selling because I did recruitment before this.
Oh, God.
Yeah, on the phone.
That was good training for you.
Very good training.
Very, very good training, but it's not fun.
It's not enjoyable in the way that this is a fun sociable industry.
You've got all your networking events, you can meet people.
BCFA events.
It's actually not called the BCFA anymore.
Oh, no, it's not.
It's called the CIUK, Commercial Interiors UK.
I can't remember the name of that.
Yeah, they decided to rebrand.
I guess British Contract Furniture Association sounds a bit stuffy.
Commercial Interiors UK is a little bit modern and it involves commercial as well.
It is what it is.
It is what it is and it does sound a bit more modern.
It's got a cool branding logo and things like that.
That's what I've done for it.
We have the industry luncheon.
We have the barbecue, which is fun.
Lots of drinking, which I like at these events.
It's really good fun.
Yeah, it's good.
You always meet different people as well.
It's a creative industry, so it's not stuffy, which is always a problem, I think.
I'd hate to work in a corporate world or something like that.
Yeah, I love getting into the room with all the designers and the BCFA.
CIUK.
The UK events are awesome because there's so many designers and everyone's so flamboyant
and everyone's kind of like...
It's great.
From a networking perspective, it's great because you drink and you talk to people.
It's a good way of talking to people in a non-work environment.
I think that's quite important.
I don't know if you... When you have people selling to you, you don't want people being
too strong, coming on too strong with the selling, do you?
No.
I've got someone ringing me every couple of weeks at the moment and you're just like,
oh.
It's annoying.
I didn't think that people still behave like that from a sales point of view.
It's all kind of related to it.
It's about... You do have to be persistent because as a salesperson, you can't not be
persistent.
Remember me.
There's a line between being persistent...
And annoying.
Yeah.
It's hard not to cross it because you don't want people to forget you.
There are a couple of designers I work with who don't mind that I call them all the time
because they know they're like, yeah, I'm useless.
Just keep calling me and I'll answer eventually and we'll meet, which is fine.
I'll keep doing that.
Then there's others where you know you can't call too much.
You can't just drive them mad.
That's fine.
It isn't that... You're right.
It's not that type of industry where we're double glazing or anything like that.
It's interesting.
Working in the States, they love British salespeople because we are much more... Americans are
so like, hey man, it's so over the top.
Whereas we talk to them.
Educate them.
We just talk to them like people.
We have conversations with them and it's much more relaxed.
Whereas these... Yeah.
People buy from people, don't they?
They do.
That's what I was taught in recruitment.
I had this boss who was very David Brint-esque.
But he did... That was actually one of the first things he said to me, people buy from
people.
It is very true because we sell fabric, which is lovely, but we've got over six of our competitors
who sell basically the same fabric, buy it from the same people we do.
It's about how the relationships you build to sell that.
I think as a designer, you have to be... Especially if you're freelance, you have to be a salesperson.
I think everyone has to sell in their job.
Because you have to get the work and then you have to sell your design.
Yeah, absolutely.
You and I, Cheryl, both had sales jobs, haven't we?
I think that's done us so well.
Even if you work in a big, big, big... One of the big global design practices, you do
have to be selling.
You do have to sell your designs to your bosses or the bosses then have to sell it to the
corporations.
If you're not confident and... You've got to be confident in what you're
making.
Yeah, definitely.
You don't present it properly and you don't sell it properly, then no one's going to believe
you if you don't believe yourself.
Yeah.
No, I agree.
You have to sell yourself and then the product will follow.
Unless the product is not very good and you're a bit fucked.
It's always good.
Our product's always good, so that's why.
You like our product, correct?
Love your product.
I've been working with you for a long time.
Long time.
Twenty... Too many years.
Twenty-two years.
Oh my God, I'm so old.
Do you know how old I was then?
Don't go down that road.
Go on, go on, tell me.
Ten.
Fuck off.
I'm 32.
Yeah.
So when I started, I started in 2016.
Oh my God, so that was seven years ago.
Yeah, I was 25, fresh.
Fresh as daisy.
Slightly more hair.
Shaggy hair.
All that driving.
Well thank you very, very much, James.
Thank you for having me.
I really enjoyed that.
Coming in and educating us.
That's all right.
What are you guys up to this weekend?
I'm getting ready to go on holiday next week.
Oh, you're away next week, aren't you?
I am at a music festival.
If it doesn't chuck it down with rain.
Tomorrow's my turn.
Yeah, I think I'll do that one day.
I'm going to do that one day.
I think I'll do that on Sunday.
Sunday's meant to be nice.
Yeah.
So do that on Sunday.
Get your rallies out.
Yeah.
What are you doing?
I'm going to my friends tomorrow night and I'm meeting my mate's new baby and then I'm
playing golf and then I'm out with my wife on Sunday.
Nice, busy weekend.
Busy, relaxing nice though.
Yeah.
Busy nice.
Yeah.
We're going to sign off now.
I hope you're having a good day.
Thanks for having me on.
Thank you.
You're very welcome.
I really enjoyed it.
Ciao.
Well that was fun with James.
Yeah so good to see him.
So good to see him and lots of interesting information in there I thought.
Yeah I think we put the world to rights a little bit.
I'm not sure if we talked about Fabric the whole time but then we didn't talk about Cradle
to Cradle with Lewis last time.
The whole time either.
No exactly.
Exactly.
Well you know, I was going to go and sit down with my wife and tell you a story that I
love.
I like when you're in the garden.
You know it's a great place and you can have a little bit of a walk around and you can
see all the plants and plants and plants.
And I was thinking about what I could do with the garden and what I could do with the garden
I'm not sure if we talked about fabric the whole time,
but then we didn't talk about Cradle to Cradle
with Lewis last time, the whole time either.
No, exactly, exactly.
In terms of upholstery fabrics,
do you have any tips for designers or any favorites?
Do you have any favorites of upholstery fabrics
that you like to use?
Obviously, sunbrow fabrics, sunbrow design even.
I think it really, as we touched on in the discussions,
we just have a James.
I think it's really important that what you're selecting
is specific to the project that you're working on.
So whilst, you know, I would naturally gravitate
towards natural fibers, natural textures,
natural, like neutral colors or like really muted tones,
just because that's what I feel quite comfortable with
from a design point of view,
but it depends on the project, doesn't it?
You know, it completely depends on the project.
I think it's really important.
One of the things that I really wanted to get across
was it's really important to make sure that it's suitable.
Like in terms of Martindale, rub tests,
make sure that you've got the right fiber retardancy.
And in terms of, you know,
if you're designing a restaurant or a pub
or you're doing something commercial,
it's got to be crib five, otherwise you're not complying.
Yeah, I think also though, excuse me,
I think also, you know, whilst obviously James
was talking about very much the kind of commercial
side of things and the commercial side of the business
and the requirements from a commercial point of view,
there is no reason why you can't replicate that
in a residential project that you're working on.
But it's important to have those,
to think about those considerations because, you know,
when you're, if you're doing a residential project,
you know, and you're doing a new build or you're refurbing
or you're extending and you're putting product in there
that, you know, you want it to last, don't you?
You don't want to be, well, hopefully,
you don't want to be in a situation where, you know,
you've paid a lot of money for a sofa
and then the sofa is, you know, three years down the line,
it needs changing.
So I think it's important from both commercial
and residential point of view
that that kind of stuff's considered really, but.
I suppose I'm thinking if you had a,
like a bit of fixed seating in a kitchen
where they had seven kids in the house,
like you would put a commercial fabric in there, wouldn't you?
You'd put like a.
Oh yeah, and actually.
Bone leather or something.
It's funny because I did,
a few years back for a friend of mine,
did, helped her out with her kitchen layout.
And we did a bench seat, a curved bench seat
on the end of the island with a round table in it.
And I, in fact, we specified one of Sunbury's fabrics.
Alan did it for us.
And he, yeah, we specified a Sunbury fabric for that reason.
And also I think it had the.
Oh God, I've completely forgotten what it was called.
Not Scotchgard.
Aquacline.
And it was, it had got the Aquacline treatment in it.
And it, and I said to her, you know,
we need to look at that because it's right
at the end of the island.
You know, you're using it day in, day out.
You don't want to be, you know,
having to deal with stains and stuff on it.
So yeah.
Yeah, I agree.
Yeah, I've known James and his family for a long time.
And they're really lovely people
and they're just easy to work with.
That's why I, that's why I think they're my main cast.
Cause he's just really cool.
I think that makes a massive difference, doesn't it?
When you're, you know, dealing with a company
that you know very well and you know that they,
they do, they say what they, oh my God,
they do what they say they do.
And they're just easy to work with.
That's kind of all we want, isn't it?
From a design, you know, as a designer is just to.
Yeah, if you get, to work with good people.
If you want some camera examples from them,
they do it quick and they just move.
They keep a load of stock.
Yeah.
And their range is huge, isn't it?
I mean, it's absolutely huge.
And most of, I think one of the things I love about them
is that I can trust that all of it is commercial.
So if I need to go, if I'm doing a commercial project,
need it to be tough.
You know that I don't even need to think about it
when I'm working on some of the fabrics.
Yeah, I agree, I agree.
Yeah.
Cause I know that they're all crib five
and they're all really tough.
Yeah.
So whereas a lot of fabric companies do both, don't they?
They do commercial and resi.
Yeah, yeah.
It just makes your job a little bit harder
to kind of filter out the stuff
and make sure what you're specifying is, you know,
is suitable for the project you're working on.
But yeah, that was cool.
It was really good to catch up with him.
Yeah.
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