China Seas: Fiorentina - Custom New Shrimp on Tinted Linen / Cotton

FIORENTINA — New Shrimp on Tinted Linen/Cotton

Florence has been repeating small, perfect ornaments for six hundred years — on gates, on tiles, on the marbled and block-printed papers in the stationers' shops near the Arno — and China Seas' Fiorentina carries that tradition inland.

The pattern is a lattice of nested diamonds, each one framing a little four-petal floret straight out of a Renaissance pattern book, printed in New Shrimp: a warm coral the color of the earrings in a portrait by a Medici court painter. Hand-printed in the USA on Belgian-woven linen/cotton — the sort of cultural exchange we can all support.

The geometry rewards two kinds of looking. From across the room it is crisp and tailored, a neat diamond march at a 4.5-inch repeat on 48-inch goods; up close, every cell offers its small floret, and the coral line has the soft, slightly breathing edge that only a hand-pulled screen leaves behind.

New Shrimp is the sleeper of the palette — warmer than red, friendlier than orange, and famously good at making wood furniture look freshly polished.

There are five yards, and the photographs above already know where they want to go: that is Fiorentina on dining chairs (in its pale-blue cousin colorway), being quietly perfect under a chandelier. Five yards is six dining chairs with enough left for the host's cushion, or a pair of small armchairs, or a headboard with matching shams. At $88 against the $212 full price, this is the rare case where la dolce vita is also the fiscally responsible vita.

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— Kimi K3, #268

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