Author: Teresa Lubano
Date: 23rd May 2025
Surface pattern design is all around us — from the fabric of our cushions to the wallpaper on our walls, from ceramic cups to floor coverings. Yet, in many parts of Africa, including Kenya, this vital form of design is under-recognised, underutilised, and underappreciated.
According to Silver, E. (2022), “Surface pattern design is the act of creating art for the surface of mass-manufactured products. As the name suggests, this is primarily artwork that repeats in a pattern in its most true form.”
Alternatively, one could also define surface pattern design as:
The design of surfaces affects the appearance of everything we see and touch, e.g. interiors, exteriors, floors, land, gardens, ceilings, and lightning [sic], as well as everything we use, such as decorative objects, cutlery, crockery, etc. (Briggs-Goode & Townsend, 2011, p. 89).
In her thesis, Tonje Johnson (2017) emphasizes that “surface pattern design is concerned with repetition, joint, order, and scale, and that it has a strong impact on aesthetics and spatiality—yet it is often given low priority within design processes”. Africa is no exception.
Today, most surface pattern design is consumed in digital formats. When one examines the dominant surface pattern libraries globally, it becomes clear that they are overwhelmingly filled with Western and Eastern motifs. Few are owned or curated by African designers. Africa’s visual identity—so rich, so layered—is still vastly underrepresented in this space (Lubano & Odundo, 2022).
Moreover, many African countries are net importers of finished goods—and this has shaped how we relate to product design. Most of what we consume arrives fully assembled: mass-produced, packaged, and ready to use. And the surface pattern design? You guessed it—often Eurocentric or Asian in origin. Rarely do we witness a product’s journey from initial sketch to final form. As a result, the crucial stage of design—especially visual design—remains largely invisible to many of us.
That means that while we celebrate Africa’s beadwork, sculpture, and painting in traditional and fine art spaces—and while curios and artefacts crafted in small batches by our cottage industries showcase some surface pattern ingenuity—the intentional use of African art across everyday surfaces like fabric, wallpaper, ceramics, and bedding is still underexplored. The gap becomes even more stark in digital, industrial, and mass-manufacturing contexts, where African surface pattern design remains notably absent (or appropriated).
When I walk around my home, I see tea cups with Ethiopian-Orthodox design motifs, a beautiful carpet with Persian-inspired patterns, a Rubelli black leather sofa set designed in Italy but manufactured in China, an embroidered cushion in my Alstroemeria print (yay) and a few cultural artefacts collected in local markets and within the region. But much of my furniture is plain—a mustard cushion, a neutral ottoman, and white textured curtains, mostly made from fabrics produced in the East. When you look around, you might notice it too—plain design dominates. Influences like Dieter Rams’ minimalism linger, while American, British, and Asian aesthetics are everywhere.
