By Design

Top to bottom, left to right: Detail from März cover by Weisbeck Flash Surface; Prate; David J. Weissberg; William Morris; Robert Stack is not a pattern; 3EIGE (the author)

Zeitergeist. Victorian patterns soon haunting a coffee-table book near you.

Patterns are the shit. After years of cold, hard lines and over-teched fliers covered in arrows, the electronic-music scene is showing that it’s ready for some tricked-out organic Victorian business to offset all this futurism and ’80s low-fi irony. Whether it’s tiled-wallpaper patterns or stand-alone frilly line art, pattern works are destined for greatness. If you’re no good at patterns yourself, team up with a Marxist lesbian printmaker who’s been doing it for years and show her the wonders of capitalism. In two years you can bet the ghosts of pattern greats like William Morris and Candace Wheeler will be back with a vengeance to claim royalties from those of us too lazy to make our own shit. Be prepared, be very prepared.