Timorous Beasties was established in Glasgow in 1990 by Alistair McAuley and Paul Simmons, who met studying Textile Design at Glasgow School of Art.

Timorous Beasties’ work embodies a unique diversity of pattern, ranging from design that echoes a golden age of copperplate engraving (a time-honoured classic is the Thistle range; or Merian Palm superwide wallpaper) to example of a distinctly edgy nature, an elegant transgression, a display of chic irreverence. Yet, the studio fully engages a design discourse with textiles history by lending an aesthetic evolution to time-honoured motifs.

In 2004 Timorous Beasties unveiled their critically acclaimed Glasgow Toile: by reversing the pastoral context of toiles de Jouy, they transformed the traditional toile device to create an exclusively modern urban genre. The Hotch Blotch fabric series challenges a 1000-year old aesthetic mode by placing disorder within the structure of damask pattern to reveal the inherent beauty of splatters, drips and blotches. Hunting Toile and Urban wallpapers mark a synthesis of 18th-century chinoiserie groupings, Rococo swirls, and Victorian silhouette paper cuts to create a uniquely contemporary ornamental textiles pattern repeat.

The art critic John Ruskin related a universal connection between nature, art and society. Timorous Beasties share a similar world view, where plants, animals and society are visually inextricable. They are devoted to how that impacts as pattern design in our daily experience of furnished spaces, from one-bedroom flats to country villas, to the halls of civic and government buildings, departure lounge backdrops, boutique enclaves, restaurants, and hotels.

Today, the Studio is a diverse operation and has emerged as a multi-award-winning, internationally acclaimed icon.

Timorous Beasties

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Timorous Beasties

Org chart

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