Home interior decorating fabrics

Decorating a home’s interior using polyester fabrics can add beauty at affordable prices.

Can polyester fabrics offer the same look as more expensive silk?

Polyester can have the same look as silk yet at a much reduced price.

A Southern California company sells polyester fabrics to retail outlets and the fabrics have been used to dress sets for the Screen Actors Guild Awards, HBO’s Big Love commemoration, and election night parties.

The fabrics are used primarily as draperies and accessories for homeowners in the United States and Canada.

“Affordable elegance is our company motto," co-founder Jason Carr of Softline Home Fashions told me. "That led us to different parts of the world to buy from. We’re inspired by so many different designs, excluding where we’re butying from now.

“There should be at least one fabric in each room. My take on deisgn is it’s like art work, a mood and feeling to the room. Curtains should bring a mood and falvor to the room.”

Softline Home Fashions, with headquarters in Gardena, California, supplies independent retailers and mass merchandisers like Bed, Bath and Beyond with fabrics imported from China, Indonesia, and India.

Company founders, and brothers, Rodney and Jason Carr, have this decorating advice for homeowners: “each room in the house should have some fabric. Decorate room-by-room in order to meet a budget and give each room its own personal effect.”

The Carrs also supply a fabric that is made from recycled water bottles.

Softline Home Furnishings started in 2001 shortly after 9/11 struck.

The Carrs say they did not have to front a lot of money to stockpile on inventory since the suppliers wanted business and allowed the Carrs to make sales and then pay for the materials once the sales were complete – a process that could take up to 90 days.

Get ideas on decorating with fabrics and see the latest trends on the following sites:

Specialtyfabricsreview.com has an article in the current issue about digital printing on fabrics:

“Mass production may have been the hallmark of American retail and design, but consumers are ditching what they see as ‘cookie-cutter’ products and using interior designers to help them create one-of-a-kind furnishings and accessories for their homes.”

Designers are making use of digital printing capabilities for fabrics that customize a home’s appearance.

The Industrial Fabrics Association International is the only trade association in the world representing the entire specialty fabrics/technical textiles industry, a global market estimated at $120 billion in 2010. It’s a great Web site to use for learning more about advances in fabrics with links to additional helpful resources.