Sandy Chilewich

Sandy Chilewich (1951- ) was born in New York and is a top textile designer. She didn't study art or design. In fact, in her early 20s, she thought she might like to be a psychologist, but she really didn't like school, so she dropped out.

At the age of 27, she and an art teacher friend in her building were buying cloth shoes in Chinatown, which they bleached and dyed bright colors. They called them HUE shoes and started by offering them to friends, and then they decided to show them to Vogue, who gave them a two-page spread. Asked what else they had to offer, they started dying white cotton stockings. Thus, she and Kathy Moskal started the legwear company HUE in 1978, which they sold in 1994.

After launching her own design studio in 1997, she introduced the RayBowl and RayTray, which featured a metal frame covered with stretch netting and a simple mechanism to hold the fabric in a concave plane. These were awarded utility patents and numerous awards. Following the success of that design, she created a completely new material she called Plynyl and began to manufacture floor mats, placemats, and totes. Her career was solidified when she won the coveted Editor's Award at the 2001 International Contemporary Furniture Fair (ICFF).

Today, with husband/business partner Joe Sultan, she manages Chilewich | Sultan LLC. Their collection has been expanded to include new textures, colors and products, including woodgrain vinyl prints, striped patterns, asymmetrical placemats and floormats, and even iPhone cases.

Chilewich continues to define how people dress their tables and cover their floors.

From chilewich.com, dwr.com, americanexpress.com, and dwell.com

RayBowls
dreamlightradio.com

RayTray
shopgrounded.com

Table runner
ekhayahome.com

Table runner and mats
dwell.com

Placemats
us.amara.com

Woodgrain floor mat
popsugar.com

Pet mats
nytimes.com