Painting copied for duvet design, artist suggests
Company officials say inspiration came from pattern they had purchased
A Calgary artist says the design of her painting which hung at a store in Mount Royal Village for eight months is being used on a bedspread that’s available for purchase online by the store, without her permission.
Jill Paddock says the bedding pattern is “frighteningly similar” to her artwork, which was on display at the West Elm store until quite recently.
But earlier this month, Paddock said she received a text message from her friend who noticed the similarities between the bedding pattern and the painting when she saw the former in a product email from West Elm.
“She texted me a picture and said ‘is this yours?’ and I was really surprised to see it,” Paddock said. “The first thing I did was I called the local store because I have a really good relationship working with them and I wanted to see if they had if … they knew about it.”
Her painting features an abstract collage made up of yellow, blue and white petals.
“That specific style is one that I’ve done before in other colours,” she said. “It’s sort of like abstract floral or abstract petals, which I also found interesting that that’s what they named it, is ‘(Organic) Abstract Petals.’”
Paddock said she contacted West Elm and waited more than two weeks for a response. When lawyers for the company called her back, they denied any infringement.
“They say the colours are different, it’s not an exact copy, they had inspiration from a different source which they paid for,” said Paddock, adding the company emailed her a copy of the purchased pattern that inspired the bedding design.
But she said that although the duvet isn’t “an exact copy” of her artwork, the pattern it’s based on “looks more like stripes” than petals.
“They also sent me the duvet in the mail so I could see it myself,” Paddock said. “But I still really feel like when I look at all of those three things next to each other, the duvet looks more like my artwork than their purchased pattern.”
A spokesperson for West Elm said the company is “continuing to research the matter and will provide updates as appropriate.”
“We have been in touch with Ms. Paddock and understand her position. West Elm has been a fervent supporter of local artists and makers from around the world since its founding,” Dru Ortega stated.
“While we would never willingly infringe an artist’s work, we take Ms. Paddock’s claims seriously and have been thoroughly reviewing the development and design of the organic abstract petals duvet. Design integrity is vital to our success, and we design 90% of our products ourselves from our Brooklyn, New York headquarters to ensure we maintain our authenticity and unique design perspective.”
Paddock said she feels it “couldn’t really be a coincidence just how similar” the two items look.
“I just hope they’ll get back to me and at least acknowledge or recognize that they maybe are in the wrong,” she said.