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Carnegie Builds Crush Into a Playful Study in Color and Pattern

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Carnegie Builds Crush Into a Playful Study in Color and Pattern

by Hayley Arsenault

The point of departure for Crush hinged on a question of order: what happens when color comes first? Carnegie's latest collection let palette lead and pattern follow, its colors developed as a family and its bold graphics, painterly florals, playful geometries, and embroidered radial bursts drawn across them.

Courtesy of Carnegie.

Seven designs make up the series, spanning upholstery, drapery, and wallcovering across 39 SKUs. Each one carries a room by itself, while the shared palettes turn the group into a toolkit for high-performance commercial interiors, where the richest schemes come from layering designs against one another. “It's a celebration of individuality, self-expression, and joy, embracing bold color, organic forms, playful geometry, and unexpected combinations,” says Aliesha Crosby, Design Director at Carnegie. “We wanted the collection to feel optimistic, approachable, and full of possibility.”

Courtesy of Carnegie.

Built to Layer 
Across the collection, pattern moves through distinct visual registers: the looping curves of Discovery, the painterly florals of Fable, and the directional geometry of Sculpt. All three are built on a Sunbrella substrate of solution-dyed acrylic and polyester, approved for indoor and outdoor use, and hold 1,500 hours of lightfastness. Discovery layers curved forms into a dynamic optical composition, available in six high-contrast colorways and rated for 100,000 double rubs. Fable takes a softer, more fluid route, with abstracted florals that bring movement and depth to five colorways; it achieves 85,000 double rubs. Sculpt gives the group its strongest sense of direction, using bold geometry to anchor layered schemes. It comes in three colorways and is rated for 100,000 double rubs.

Courtesy of Carnegie.

The tactile side of the collection has a different cadence. Mood has the plushness of velvet, its surface catching light and shifting in tone across seven colorways for upholstery and drapery; its face is woven from 50 percent recycled Trevira CS polyester. Wink breaks its surface into a pointillist texture, using Seaqual yarn to turn recovered marine plastic into a high-performance upholstery rated for 70,000 double rubs and offered in six colorways. Amp finishes the sequence with a chunky woven structure whose visible depth comes from a combination of post-consumer recycled and biobased content. It is available in eight colorways and rated for 100,000 double rubs.

Courtesy of Carnegie.

Embroidery Meets Biobased Xorel

Aperture Embroider brings finely stitched radial bursts to Biobased Xorel, creating movement, dimension, and tactile detail across an open ground. As the latest addition to Carnegie's Biobased Xorel line, the design pairs 91 percent rapidly renewable, plant-based content with the finish-free construction, durability, and cleanability associated with the material.

Courtesy of Carnegie.

“Biobased Xorel has always been something we're incredibly proud of, and with Aperture Embroider, we're showing a new, more creative dimension of what that material can do, bringing embroidered pattern and tactile detail to a product built on some of the most rigorous sustainability credentials in the industry,” says Gordon Boggis, CEO of Carnegie.

Courtesy of Carnegie.

The embroidered textile is specified for wallcovering, upholstered walls and panels, and upholstery in four colorways. It is cleanable with water-, solvent-, and bleach-based solutions and exceeds Type II criteria for wallcovering performance. Aperture Embroider is free of antimicrobials, ozone-depleting chemicals, PFAS, PVC, and Red List chemicals, and carries an EPD, California Proposition 65, Cradle to Cradle Certified Gold, Cradle to Cradle Material Health Platinum Certification, LEED, Mindful Materials, SCS Indoor Advantage Gold, and USDA Certified Biobased Product designations. At the end of its service life, the textile is eligible for Carnegie's responsible return program.

Courtesy of Carnegie.

Across the seven designs, the material specification holds a consistent line: PFAS-free, low-emitting, and available with recycled content, biobased fibers, and Seaqual marine plastic. For Boggis, those choices are part of what makes Crush worth experiencing firsthand. “We hope designers come by, get their hands on it, and see and feel for themselves that you truly don't have to choose between great design and responsible materials – Carnegie gives you both.”