The Original Banana Leaf Print - now on Grasscloth! It could be argued that natural sisal is the material that Martinique®, our tropical talisman stemming from a Bahamian sojourn in 1941, should always have graced. Here it is, many decades later—and not a moment too soon—as we kick off the year of Martinique’s 80th Birthday! Painstakingly printed to order in the USA on natural grasscloth — this texture; that print? It’s a match made in...the tropics.

The history of our most iconic pattern is as vibrant as the tropical palms that inspired it over eight decades ago. Upon returning from their tropical vacation, our second generation owners Remy & Lucile Chatain sought to recreate not just the rich visual landscapes they had experienced there, but the sense of lushness and exuberance those sights had filled them with, too.

Together with their friend, noted illustrator and textile designer Albert Stockdale, they designed a large-scale botanical pattern to recapture and evoke those feelings, and mounted it in their showroom.

When Don Loper, the well-known apparel and interior designer tasked with the Beverly Hills Hotel redesign came into their showroom, he knew he’d found the look he wanted. He re-created the Chatains’ mural-style installation he’d seen at the showroom, and expanded it to fit the corridors of the hotel. The result? An ageless icon.

This year, we are so thrilled to be able to say that we have proudly been producing the authentic Martinique® banana leaf fabric and wallpaper for eighty years.