Meet Sarah Ellison

Based in Byron Bay, Sarah worked as a professional stylist for many years before launching her namesake furniture and home accessories label in 2017.

We have recently used Sarah’s pieces in the social spaces at Far East Consortium’s West Side Place and the 640 Bourke Street Display Suite.
Here are a few words we shared:

What elements of fashion are resonant in your collections?

I like the pieces in my collections to feel like your favourite coat or pair of leather shoes, it’s important that my designs are tactile and feel great to touch, just like beautiful fashion. I also like the idea of layering to design a room, much like when you are putting together an outfit. I like combining texture and pattern, material and scale and bringing them all together to create something unique.

There is a discernible element of nostalgia in your work- which decade has had the most influence?

So far it has been the 1970’s, maybe because they are my earliest memories of design as a child. But I also love the confidence of 70’s interior design, so bold and experimental, comfortable, and textured. I love all periods in design, each one has something to take away. I’m fining myself drawn to elements of the 1950s at the moment and a few of these characteristics have been appearing in some new designs we are working on.

Your practice incorporates furniture, objects and styling – do you feel there is a symbiotic relationship between these things, and how do they rely on and influence each other?

I think because my background was in styling, it definitely informs the way that I work and my process. When I’m designing furniture, I’m usually not just thinking about that piece singularly but thinking about what kind of space it would work in, what it would add to the room aesthetically and how it would play off of other things in the space. From my styling work I became well aware of the gaps in the market and that sometimes informs me also, not from a commercial perspective but more from the point of view of pieces I want but can’t find in Australia – or at a reasonable price point.