Rocky Mountain Bees & Wildflowers

There is something deeply optimistic about a wildflower.

Nobody planted it.

Nobody made a spreadsheet.

Nobody stood over it discussing whether this was really the best location for the brand.

It just showed up.

Then the bees showed up because apparently somebody has to get some work done.

That is basically the spirit behind my Rocky Mountain Bees & Wildflowers Collection — inspired by the wild landscapes of Utah or.. Montana and the Rocky Mountain West, where nature somehow manages to look beautifully composed while absolutely refusing to follow instructions.

The collection takes watercolor wildflowers, bees, warm mountain-meadow colors and turns them into repeating geometric patterns.

Which sounds slightly contradictory.

Wildflowers are supposed to be wild.

Patterns are supposed to behave.

I wanted both.

A little meadow chaos, but with structure.

Because apparently even nature looks better when somebody tells it where the repeat tile ends.

The designs move between loose botanical watercolor and almost kaleidoscopic symmetry. From a distance, some look geometric. Get closer and suddenly there are flowers everywhere.

And bees.

Lots of bees.

Tiny employees who were absolutely not consulted about appearing in a textile collection.

The nice thing about a seamless pattern is that it doesn’t have to remain a picture.

It can become fabric.

And fabric has considerably more ambition.

Make curtains.

Make pillows.

Make a quilt.

Make a dress.

Cover a chair.

Sew a tote bag.

Create something completely unnecessary but extremely beautiful simply because you can.

Or skip the sewing machine entirely and get the pattern on finished pieces and merch.

That’s what I like about surface pattern design.

The artwork isn’t really finished when I finish drawing it.

That’s when it starts wandering off and becoming things.

A flower becomes fabric.

Fabric becomes a pillow.

The pillow ends up on somebody’s couch in another state.

Meanwhile, somewhere in Utah, another wildflower is growing beside a trail with absolutely no idea it has accidentally entered the home décor industry.

I think there’s something nice about that.

We spend ridiculous amounts of time trying to organize life into neat little patterns.

Nature doesn’t.

It repeats, but never perfectly.

The same mountains look different every hour.

The same meadow is never really the same meadow twice.

Flowers disappear.

New ones show up.

Bees continue doing whatever mysterious administrative work keeps the planet functioning.

Maybe that’s why these patterns became so geometric without ever feeling completely geometric.

There is structure.

But there is still something alive underneath it.

A little imperfect.

A little unpredictable.

A little Rocky Mountain meadow that somehow found its way onto fabric.

And frankly, if I’m going to bring something from the wilderness into the house, wildflowers and bees seem considerably more practical than a bear.

If this little piece of Rocky Mountain meadow has given you ideas, you can take it considerably further than a pillow. The pattern is available as fabric on Contrado, so sew it, quilt it, upholster something with it, turn it into clothing, bags, curtains, or whatever strange and beautiful thing your sewing machine is willing to participate in.

Find the Rocky Mountain Bees & Wildflowers fabric on Contrado.