It's always a pleasure to come across a new (to me) brand making in the UK. The Leaping Fox sells silk scarves (some of pocket square size) delightfully illustrated with hand-painted images celebrating the urban fox and the wider concept of Britishness - all influenced by the founders' Indian roots.
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| 'Weather the Weather' Pocket square and scarf design |
The Leaping Fox was founded by Savio and Shailee Noronha who told me something about how they design their scarves:
"The Leaping Fox was born when, as Londoners, we came face to face with the vision of a London Red Fox leaping into the night. Amidst grimy pavements and by the light of a crackling street lamp, but beautiful nonetheless.We wanted to recreate the beauty of that moment and that creature that was loved and loathed... We were also keen to create a brand that supported British craftsmanship and quality, but without ignoring our Indian roots and our years with Indian art and design in a fashion context.The Leaping Fox became a union of our Indian roots and our British lifestyle. We were drawn to a wonderful artist in India, Bharat Chandrayan. He has decades of experience in the art of Rajasthani Miniature Painting, painting beautiful scenes of Rajput life from the 17th and 18th century on pure silk. Savio met him quite by chance on a visit to Udaipur, and ended up commissioning him to paint a fox in typical Rajasthani Miniature painting style.
We concluded that The Leaping Fox had to portray the eccentricity, resilience and beauty of this amazing creature that has adapted so well to urban life. Our design inspirations are mostly from our observations of life in Britain - the British obsession with the Weather, with Chocolate, with Ice Cream, with Bicycles, with Birdwatching and the debate on Fox Hunting.
Bharat-ji, as we call him with respect, executed these designs as per our detailed instructions. But fully allowed the influence of his training and expertise in Rajasthani Miniature Painting to seep through each artwork. The result is a beautiful amalgamation of Indian art in a very British context.
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| Bharat Chandrayan working on a design |
Anyone who sees our scarves in the flesh exclaims how beautiful they would look framed as paintings. And this is all down to Bharat-ji’s tireless efforts in executing each art work as authentically as possible.
The paintings are sent to us, we make minimal tweaks and add in the necessary borders and logos and they’re ready for printing at our amazing printers in the north west of England. They’re printed on the finest silks, hand roll hemmed and ready for dispatch in their stunning presentation boxes. Which by the way are also made in Britain!
Our aim is to avoid the use of plastic in our packaging as much as possible, and we plan to return the bags they are sent to us in by our printers for re-use. We also support The Fox Project for the very meaningful work they do in protecting the fox population in the areas they work."
The Leaping Fox offer scarves measuring 90 x 90 cm which would suit either sex and smaller ones, which at 40cm square make perfect pocket squares. They are printed in England, have hand-rolled edges and are made of a soft, luxurious silk that makes a perfect pochette.
These gorgeously different silk scarves are works of art in themselves and are available from The Leaping Fox who have kindly offered a 20% discount for blog readers until 15th April quoting GREYFOX20 at the checkout.
This is an unsponsored post. I received a sample to review.
This is an unsponsored post. I received a sample to review.
