John Boyd Fabrics London Fabric Co is delighted to include in its range of companies the unique horsehair fabrics produced by John Boyd Textiles. First established in Castle Cary in 1837, John Boyd Textiles is proud to maintain the tradition of horsehair weaving. Horsehair fabrics are woven with the finest and best quality tail hair from live horses and cotton or silk warps using the original looms and techniques from 1870. Horsehair fabric was originally used by famous furniture designs such as Chippendale, Hepplewhite, Lutyens and Rennie Mackintosh, and are ideally suited to most forms of upholstered furniture, antique, classical and contemporary.

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To this day, horsehair fabrics are widely recognized for their unequalled lustre, durability, care properties and value. Horsehair fabrics have been used with many prestigious projects throughout the world. John Boyd Textiles is now one of the last companies in the world still weaving hair cloth. Although the historical traditional fabrics are still woven today, contemporary designers also appreciate the unique qualities of horsehair fabrics. Many new designs and colours have been added to the collection in recent years.

Recently John Boyd Textiles received an award at the Decorex Exhibition 2001 for Best Stand Design for presenting horsehair fabrics in a contemporary setting and also the D&D Award for 'Product Design of the Year' in 2003. Although the same historical designs and colours from 1750 onwards are still produced, many new colours and contemporary designs have been added in recent years. John Boyd Textiles produce an extensive range of nearly 150 horsehair fabrics and are also able to weave custom colours for a minimum of 20 meters. You can see the entire John Boyd range at the London Fabric Company showroom. The blue/black check was originally used by Charles Rennie Mackintosh in the late 1800's for covering the Argyle Street Tearoom chairs. John Boyd Textiles are delighted to have been able to exactly reproduce the horsehair fabric with blue and black hair and it has now been woven for the first time in over 100 years. The new colourways of this design have been very well received by contemporary designers and architects. The fabric is now called Dales, named after a type of horse like the other horsehair fabrics in our collection. The Ermine black ER/601/1 horsehair fabric was originally used by Sir Edwin Lutyens for his original Napoleon chair made in 1919, the original in now in the V&A museum. We are still producing the same fabric on the same loom for reproductions of this chair made by the Lutyens family. Horsehair fabrics are woven with a cotton warp and horsehair weft across the width of the fabric. Horsehair is sourced from live horses to give the best quality fabric. Black horsehair is overdyed to give a pure shiny black sheen to the fabrics. Mixed Grey horsehair is a mixture of brown tones and is used undyed to give a wonderful natural strae in the fabric. Both types of horsehair give a fabric width of 65 cms (26"). Natural white horsehair is in the natural form to give the lovely pale ivory coloured fabrics and is also bleached and dyed giving an exceptional range of colours. These horsehair fabrics are 56 cms wide (22") due to the shorter length of white horsehair. In recent years, John Boyd Textiles is able to offer the service of hand embroidered designs on horsehair fabric. We are able to reproduce any design with no minimum. The collaborations of John Boyd Textiles with various projects in the UK and abroad range from the Ritz and Hyde Park Hotels, to Spencer House and the Hampton Court, to David Morris and Theo Fennell, to the Garrick and Saint Andrews Golf Clubs, to the V&A and Vivienne Westwood, to the Met in New York, the Peninsula Hotel in Manila, the Royal Palace in Oslo, the White House in Washington, to name but a few. Recent projects have involved reproducing crests for King Gustav III of Sweden and St Andrews Golf Course Board room chairs.

John Boyd Fabric Advice: At our London Fabric shop our experienced staff can advise on appropriate John Boyd fabrics given your design and use choices over a cup of coffee. Additional times before and after normal working hours available by appointment whereby you can spend time choosing your fabric undisturbed. John Boyd fabric samples available to view.