The SuitsGreyFox Project 2: Designing the Cloth

In the first blog post on the SuitsGreyFox Project I explained how I'd been invited to design a cloth with Johnstons of Elgin. Famous for their cashmere, merino and lambswool cloths, their mill in Elgin takes raw fibre and dyes, spins and weaves it: all these operations are carried out in the same factory. I'll cover manufacture in the next part of this series; but how is a cloth designed?

Johnstons work with household name international fashion houses and play a large part in producing some iconic designs. Working with their design team I firstly had a look at Johnston of Elgin's wonderful archive, a room full of ancient and fragile leather-bound books containing samples of cloths woven in the mill since Victorian times.

In the Johnston of Elgin archive

Leafing through the books I looked for elements of design that I liked; colours, checks, texture, patterns. I had in mind a Prince of Wales check, and it was lucky I had this idea as a start - without it I would have been overcome by the huge variety of possibilities.

A check with a soft blue overcheck caught my eye

I was taken with a grey check and found a sample with a subtle, soft broad blue overcheck. It seemed to me that this may add a slightly different element to the final design. I also went though more modern and contemporary designs for further inspiration, aided by Brian Hinnigan, Design & Sales Director at Johnstons.

Looking though the collection with Brian Hinnigan, Design & sales Director

Over the next few weeks Brian worked on the design elements I specified and sent me various CAD printouts, showing the possibilities of pattern and colour using the colour library of some 6,500 hues. I considered a range of palettes from brownish red to grey. Brian advised me that a pure cashmere cloth wouldn't have the durability necessary for a suit, so we planned for a cashmere/merino mix. I'll say more about that in Part 3 of this series when I describe the manufacture of the cloth. 

CAD printouts showing some of the design possibilites

After some discussion and tinkering with colours and design elements we ended up with several possibilities. At this stage a section blanket was woven. This exciting stage of the process produces a section of cloth into which all the design options are printed in squares. The blanket was cut up and sent to me for a final decision.

The cut-up section blanket showing the design options

Selecting a final design for weaving was hard, but not impossible. I knew that I wanted a wearable design, useful and durable enough for town or country use, so charcoal/grey with a blue overcheck were the colours of choice. I also wanted a design that was different and had some impact: not enough to make me feel self-conscious wearing the suit, but enough to make a statement. This was the design that I selected:

Throughout I found that Brian and the design team had an uncanny ability to interpret what I was after. I had a reasonably clear picture in my head of what the cloth might look like. The final product is exactly what I had in mind.

In the next part of this feature I'll tell you more about the cloth, its construction and how it was woven.

See more at Johnstons of Elgin. The suit was tailored by Dege & Skinner (this will be featured in part 4 of this series).