One of my all-time favorite fabrics – and I mean real, love-it-like-crazy, can’t-do-a-project-without-it favorite fabrics – is toile.

Toile, or toile du jouy (to give it its full name) is a traditional fabric of French design, featuring one-color pastoral scenes on a white or cream background. The word ‘toile’ literally means ‘cloth’ in French and its origins can be traced back as far as the 1700s when it was first produced by a commercial plant in the village of Jouy-en-Josas.

Subtly elegant and still popular today as a home décor print, toile has a fascinating history that sets it apart from other materials on the market.

Traditional black and white toile pastoral print (Source: Interiors Etc. Details)

Toile was first produced in 1760 in the Oberkampf factory on the banks of the Bievre River. It was printed using wooden blocks that were only about 10” big, each one engraved with a mirror image of the finished design. But the method was long and tedious, the price high, and only the rich and royal could afford the material.

Soon designers started looking for other, more viable, methods. In a stunning example of industrial espionage, textile entrepreneur Oberkampf discovered in England the secret of printing using copper-plate rollers, and smuggled the information out by writing it on cotton fabric using ‘invisible’ ink.

Christophe Oberkampf, founder of the first toile factory (Source: S9 Biographical Dictionary)

With the new method he had learnt, Oberkampf expanded his business and even earned a Legion of Honor from Napoleon! Ironically, his hard work was eventually to be destroyed. In an unrelated but gruesome twist of fate, British troops ended up destroying his factory in Jouy-en-Josas, and the printmaker died soon after, brokenhearted by the destruction of his life’s work.

Entrance hall papered in toile print (Source: Zeospot)

Today, toile fabric, paper and even ceramics are still hugely popular with designers and decorators, and the engraving-like quality of the prints remains, as well as the pastoral themes and patterns. These patterns are usually made up of joyful country scenes with a sense of frolic and carefree abandon. Oh, how I wish I could commission a custom toile, depicting a modern day in our lives! I  would be under a tree in the garden, with my two boys, our pets and my iPad or laptop of course!

More to come, as I can never run out of things to say on this topic…