NavList:

Paul Saffo you wrote: A friend just sent me this pic of thses verrrry special navigator's pillows (look closely...) -- am now trying to find where I can buy a pair, as no navigator's home could possibly be complete without these on their couch!

Paul
You’re unlikely to find an exact match.  What happens in the clothing industry and probably the loose fittings industry is the designer will sit down at their drawing board or PC and knock off a batch of similar designs on the same theme.  These will be transferred electronically to somewhere in the Third World for rapid manufacture of proofs.  The company’s salesmen will then show the proofs to buyers from the retail stores who will select and order the designs they think will sell best, and large orders of the selected designs are sent back to the Third World for manufacture in bulk.  The proofs for the unselected designs either end up in a cupboard or are sold off to the company’s employees and friends at knocked down prices.  The cushions in your photograph probably fell into that category.  It’s possible that the designer, who might have a ‘first’ in Knitwear Design, gave up Geography at an early stage in their education and remembered little more than the expression ‘North, south, east, and west’.  Our younger daughter was the designer for such a company for a couple years.  I once asked her how designers managed to find out the details for ‘tee shirts’ etc. printed with ‘Pop Group US Tour, 1999’ followed by a list of dates and venues.  Her reply was “Oh if they’re unsure they just make something up”.  It’s the style that counts, not the accuracy.  DaveP