Inner-City Chic

The logo of The Design Works of Bedford-Stuyvesant.

In today’s New York Times obituary of the fabric designer D.D. Tillett, there was a tantalizing mention of her involvement with an organization called the Design Works of Bedford-Stuyvesant. Curiosity piqued, I decided to plunge into some research. And a good thing I did: The products of Design Works were so damned good, it is amazing that the company crashed and burned so soon and that its bedlinens, wallpapers, tableware, needlepoint kits, scarves, and fabrics have been almost entirely forgotten.

Jacqueline Kennedy, an early supporter and client of the Design Works of Bedford-Stuyvesant.

Back in 1966, Jacqueline Kennedy, Billy Baldwin (her interior decorator), and D.D. and Leslie Tillett were having a conversation about ways to help improve the lives of the underprivileged. The Tilletts had already been encouraging grassroots economic opportunity and local investment in the developing world, but Kennedy felt that the couple should consider improving the lives of people in inner-city America. And soon, at the heart of one of the most depressed and disadvantaged areas of New York City, the Design Works of Bedford-Stuyvesant was born, a screenprinted-textile company that was admiringly described as “a venture in black capitalism.” And which, in its brief seven or so years of existence, won the respect of everyone from international socialites to major department stores.

A Design Works scarf.

Supported by the Bedford-Stuyvesant Development and Service Corporation and the Bedford-Stuyvesant Restoration Corporation, encouraged by the former First Lady and her brother-in-law Robert Kennedy, and put into motion with $240,000 from various backers, the Design Works was launched at the end of 1969. Design director Sherl B. Nero scoured archives and museum collections for African-theme patterns and motifs to adapt into screenprinted cottons, and residents of Bedford-Stuyvesant were brought on board to be trained in silkscreening as well as tackle the management and marketing of the firm.

“There is a problem for all such companies set up by minorities,” said Leslie Tillett. “It is that we have never let minorities, particularly blacks, into managerial, administrative and selling positions. This Design Works’ group is going to get there, to reach the top—and soon.”

A ceramic platter in the Samburu Forest pattern.

The first collection, based on motifs found in the art and crafts of the kingdom of Benin, made its debut in 1970. From the 1971 collection, inspired by the Bakuba culture of Congo, Jacqueline Kennedy (by now Mrs Onassis) ordered two floor-length tablecloths made for her dining room and commissioned Billy Baldwin to decorate the library of her 15-room apartment at 1040 Fifth Avenue with other Design Works fabrics—and then she invited House Beautiful to photograph the results. In an otherwise admiring article about the organization and Jackie O's apartment, The New York Times seemed somewhat shocked that the former First Lady would include “primitive prints of feathers and fish” alongside “the fine French 18th-century furniture, the choice Sèvres porcelains, the rare needlepoint rugs, and a fold-up, leather-covered elephant’s ladder.”

Bakuba Basket wicker-pattern bedlinens by the Design Works of Bedford-Stuyvesant and manufactured by Martex.

By 1974, the Design Works had produced more than 150 patterns, most of them adapted from African originals. Ceramics entered the line. So did needlepoint kits (Crain Harmon), carpeting (Stark Carpet), custom-made fabrics and wallpapers (Connaissance Fabrics), towels and place mats (Leacock & Co.), scarves (Baar & Beards), and bedlinens (JP Stevens, Martex). Fashion designers Donald Brooks and Pauline Trigère were big fans of Design Works imagery, what an observer described as “[s]tylized fish scales, cowrie shells, butterflies with zebra-striped and giraffe-spotted wings, [and] geometric shapes in unusual formations and color combinations.” One of the popular sheet designs, Bakuba Basket, was a strikingly sketchy black-and-white evocation of woven wicker.

Ceramic mugs in the Samburu Forest pattern.

Fabric by the Design Works of Bedford-Stuyvesant.

The products were well-made, and the company was highly praised, but as with so many noble causes, the sailing wasn't smooth. The Design Works didn’t turn a profit for seven years, and only a modest one at that. And though the company was planned as an engine for economic opportunity for Bedford-Stuyvesant, by the mid 1970s it only employed about 35 people, far less than the 250 the organizers had expected to be part of the team. By 1978, the Design Works was no more.

For those who care, Design Works products still appear from time to time on eBay. So keep your eyes open. Or better yet, why doesn’t somebody buy the licensing rights and launch the Design Works again?