INSIDE STORY
This Nottingham-based specialist in delicately patterned laser-cut screens has its roots in traditional lacemaking MILES & LINCOLN
Look at the laser-cut dividing screens in the third-floor bedroom department at Harrods, or at London’s M restaurant on Victoria Street, and you might not instantly imagine that the designs were inspired by an archive of over 3,000 original lace patterns. Yet the story of Miles & Lincoln, a three-year-old Nottingham-based company that specialises in designing and manufacturing laser-cut metal screens and panels, stems from just that.
Almost 50 years ago, Lincoln Austin founded his family business, B Siegel, which designed and supplied lace to lingerie companies all over the world. As a result of the gradual decline of the UK textiles industry B Siegel closed, but after spotting some traditional wooden
Miles & Lincoln’s screens are inspired by the 3,000 lace designs in its archive
fretwork screens online, Austin was reminded of the lace patterns collecting dust in the archive. He approached Richard Miles – formerly a lace designer at B Siegel and now design director at Miles & Lincoln – and with that, a brilliant new way of referencing the lace patterns was born. Of course, the original motifs are just the starting point: the pair put all their knowledge into creating new bespoke designs for clients requesting anything from geometric-style dividers and suspended ceilings to botanical-themed wall cladding and spiral staircases.
It was this design-comes-first sensibility that made Miles & Lincoln an obvious choice for the ELLE Decoration Style Consultancy’s first project: the show apartment on the penthouse floor of the Greenwich Peninsula marketing pavilion in London. Editor-in-chief Michelle Ogundehin commissioned two sets of oyster-coloured curved screens (top) to divide the open-plan space into distinct zones. Other recent projects include dividers for a soon-toopen hotel at Tower Bridge, garden screens for a client in Mayfair and a suspended ceiling in the directors’ dining room at West Ham United Football Club (milesandlincoln.com).