Cole & Son | Couture Carousel Cushion Pastel

The cushion carries the Couture Carousel design, sixteen figures drawn and painted by hand at Cole & Son's Chelsea showroom, each standing for a moment in the history of couture, here in the Pastel palette. At cushion scale the figures read differently from the wall: you get two or three of them rather than a procession, which turns a pattern into a picture and makes the drawing itself the subject.

It is made properly. The face is backed and piped in Colour Box Velvet, the house's own plain cloth, so the edge has a defined seam rather than a folded one and the back has weight to balance the printed face. The inner is feather and down, the only filling that holds a shape without looking inflated and collapses correctly when leaned against.

The grand size, 50 cm square, is the useful one, large enough to sit properly at the back of a sofa or against a headboard rather than disappearing among smaller cushions. It is handmade in Great Britain. The matching wallpaper is available, though the cushion is arguably better used away from it, as the one printed thing in an otherwise plain room. It is the sort of object that furnishes a chair rather than decorating it.