IT was the stuff of brewers' and waiters' aprons, ladies' stays, an emperor's battle tent and feather-filled bedding: rough-hewn blue and white linen twill. But these days, mattress ticking, a striped fabric with a checkered past, is being put to more urbane uses. Ticking is making starring appearances in the living room, as slipcovers on Regency sofas and Louis XV chairs, and is being made up into trendy neck rolls and throw pillows. When edged in bright red welting, it looks great adorning nicely worn metal garden furniture. "Sister, I think, was the originator of making ticking what it is today," said Keith Irvine, a partner in the decorating firm Irvine & Fleming in New York. He was referring to Sister Parish, a decorator who often works for New York society, and one of the first designers to take ticking out of the bedroom. "In the 40's, she was already using mattress ticking as upholstery," Mr. Irvine said. Mattress ticking has been abandoned by some bedding manufacturers who prefer the more luxurious look of damask and brocade for their customers.
"Never mind that those fabrics were more suitable for an Ungaro cocktail suit," Mr. Irvine, a member in good standing of the English country house school of decorating and a believer in reverse chic, said of the more luxurious fabrics. Price can be a consideration in choosing between the look of ticking and damask. "The cost of 100 percent cotton can be three and four times the damask cloth," said Ted Marschke, president of the 75-year-old Charles Beckley Company, a custom bedding concern based in the Bronx. Mr. Marschke noted that 75 percent of his mattresses ended up by being covered with a solid tan ticking. "People don't want it to clash with their sheets or dust ruffles," he said. Then there are Mr. Marschke's other customers: "Don't ask me why, but they insist on the classic government-issue ticking. At the Conran's Habitat chain of home furnishings stores, the new collection of mattresses that will be paraded onto selling floors this spring will be covered with that tried and true blue-and-white cotton ticking.
"The only mattresses we'll be offering," said Felicia Stingone, the publicity director of the company. The key to decorating with ticking, Mr. Irvine said, is to play off the fabric's humble beginnings. He explained that the English decorator John Fowler used it for just those "perverse" reasons. And anyway, Mr. Irvine added, it is still one of the cheapest decorating fabrics around. In New York, Beckenstein Home Fabrics at 130 Orchard Street, at Delancey Street, has 54-inch wide cotton ticking in eight colors for $12.95 a yard. "It's like the most beautiful simple cotton dress," said Mr. Irvine, who favors the black and white combination stripe. "We once did a whole room in it. It's sort of playing down, using the maid's room fabric up front." For summer, in the drawing room of a country house in Rye, N.Y., Irvine & Fleming, removed the carpets and outfitted the French fauteuils and bare-legged sofa with gray and white mattress ticking, demurely pleated. Information about the history of the once ubiquitous fabric is limited.
"Textiles in America, 1650-1870" by Florence M. Montgomery, published by W. W. Norton in 1984, states that "linen twill was the material of choice for distillers' and brewers' aprons" and that army tents were made of the same fabric. "Like so may other linen textiles," Ms. Montgomery wrote, "these were later made of cotton." In the 1940's ticking appeared in decorating books as fitted bedspreads and cafe curtains. It was homey rather than avant-garde. The interior decorator Robert Metzger likes to do things in a sweeping, lavish way, so when he uses mattress ticking, he needs lots of it. "I love to tent rooms with it," said Mr. Metzger, who bemoaned the times when it was hard to get because, the cotton was "all being dyed for bluejeans and jackets." "I'm so happy it's back," he said. The Ralph Lauren Home Collection emphasizes the homespun qualities of ticking to bolster its country look. A 56-inch-wide fabric called Ryan, available only in the classic blue and cream combination, is $40 a yard at the Polo/Ralph Lauren shop on Madison Avenue (72d Street).
Matching mattress-ticking wallpaper is $32.50 a roll. Textile firms whose showrooms serve only architects and decorators now have collections of ticking. For example, Sonia's Place, at 979 Third Avenue (59th Street) has Ralph Lauren ticking in particular, and Brunschwig & Fils, also at 979 Third Avenue, offers a wide-ranging selection of ticking and ticking look-alikes. Brunschwig's "Riga Woven Stripe" ($42 to $48.50 list a yard) and "Danzig Woven Stripe,"($52 to $58.50 list a yard) even have an imperial pedigree. The two-tone 55-inch wide fabrics are reproductions of the canvas in traditional stripes that was originally woven for Napoleon's battle campaign tent in the early 1800's. Mattress ticking is also a current best seller at Mattawan, a home furnishings shop at 491 Broadway (Broome Street) in the SoHo section of Manhattan. Ticking is transformed into duvet covers ($160) and futons (full size, $289). It is made into laundry bags ($15) throw pillows ($36) and neck rolls ($25).
The child-size garden chair with its custom-made pillow is $150. "This is the real thing, woven not printed," said Dan Krueger, the store's manager. Photos: Mattawan has ticking neck roll ($25) and pillows ($36). (Jack Manning/The New York Times); Garden chair with ticking pillow, $150 at Mattawan. (Bill Aller/The New York Times); Playing off the humble beginnings of the fabric, the decorator Keith Irvine has given formal French fauteils, above, and a Regency sofa, right, the ticking treatment. Irvine & Fleming) (pg. C6)Ticking—its name deriving from the Greek word theka, meaning case or covering—has been synonymous with mattresses since fabric was first paired with straw. For a decent night’s sleep, it was imperative that the straw, or feathers if you were lucky, be kept within the confines of a thick, tightly woven fabric to prevent quills and bits of straw from poking through and scratching. Thus a denim-like twill was woven and then coated in starch, wax, or soap to seal the weave even more tightly.
The stripes were uniformly indigo or black, and, like a petticoat, the stiff fabric was meant to do its work beneath softer and more decorative outer layers, never to be exposed to the respectable eye. It wasn’t until quite recently in ticking’s 1,000-year history that it has seen the light of day. The influential American interior decorator Sister Parish is credited with this act of liberation when she mixed chintz with ticking fabric in upscale 1940s sitting rooms. After the raised eyebrows settled, ticking soon gained popularity in more general society. Five to Buy Above: Organic Ticking in Iris, in 60 percent cotton, 40 percent linen. is 137 centimeters wide and available in a variety of colors from UK ticking king Ian Mankin; Above: The black stripe and herringbone weave identify this fabric as true ticking twill. It’s part of a collection of ticking available at Howe at 36 Bourne Street in London; go to Howe for more information. Above: Pottery Barn’s Antique Stripe is available in blue or gray;