de Le Cuona | Botanic Gardens – Cashew

Botanic Gardens is a linen cloth with a botanical pattern, and in Cashew the palette is soft and natural, a pale warm tone that reads close to neutral from a distance. The motif is large in scale and spaced generously, so it behaves more like a pattern you notice when you come closer than one that shouts across a room. It gives a plain scheme some life and some depth, and it sits happily alongside plains and textures.

The cloth is 95% linen with 5% polyamide, 130 cm wide. The vertical repeat is 67 cm and the horizontal repeat is 65 cm, so the pattern is substantial and needs room to be seen properly. The Martindale rating is 77,000 rubs, which is unusually high for linen and means we are comfortable recommending it for upholstery that gets daily use. It is a de Le Cuona cloth, sold by the half metre.

We would use Cashew for curtains in a drawing room or bedroom, where the scale of the repeat can show across a full-height window. It would also suit a pair of armchairs or a deep sofa, where the size of the pattern has the space it needs. We would pair it with plain linens in stone or putty, a soft white wall, and wood in a pale or mid tone. Keep the rest of the room quiet and let the cloth lead.

Because the repeat is large in both directions, order generously. Pattern matching across widths will use more cloth than a plain, and your workroom will need to centre the motif on each panel or cushion. Ask them to lay the pattern out before cutting. We would line and interline curtains in this cloth to help the linen hang well, and ask your upholsterer to confirm the position of the pattern on seats and backs before they cut.