METROLAND - Julian Barnes
This week sees the publication of our special archive edition of Julian Barnes’ very first novel Metroland, which was originally released in 1980.
Inspiration for the project came from the instantly recognisable original patterns for the London Underground seat fabrics. The Moquette designs created by artists including Enid Marx, Marion Dorn and Paul Nash, were predominantly geometric and brightly coloured.
Lino-cut illustrator Clare Curtis was commissioned to create a repeat pattern hinting at both the content of the novel, and the London Underground seat patterns. We asked Clare to write a couple of sentences about working on the project:
I loved the concept. Having lived in North London and frequently visited the London Transport Museum I was already familiar with the Underground and the upholstery fabric associated with it. Likewise ‘Metroland’ and all that the word conjures up; suburbia, the middle class, safe uniformity, the semi detached, rows and rows of identical houses. This, I thought, would suit the repeat pattern and geometry used in woven textiles. My main challenge was to keep the design simple so I redrew my idea on graph paper paring it down to its most basic geometric elements. Once this was done making the linocut and repeating the pattern was relatively straight forward.
Metroland is published by Vintage books on October 6th
