Glass beads raked by hand, flaws built in by machine: Maya Romanoff's Ananda

The Fall 2026 collection, named Ananda after the Sanskrit yogic word for a deep, settled kind of joy, had to carry the craftsmanship standard founder Maya Romanoff established while still serving contract and commercial interiors.

One theme, two opposite routes to calm: glass beads hand-raked into light-catching ripples, and machine-made vinyl with the flaws of a handweave built in on purpose.

Zen Kanso encapsulates thousands of tiny glass beads in a pale compound on a durable non-woven ground; an artisan pulls a brush straight down the panel in one steady stroke at a time, tilting the beads into fine vertical lines that catch the light. Tenona II goes the other way: a machine-made Type II vinyl modelled on centuries-old Japanese paper weaving, in 12 nature-inspired colourways, with slight irregularities built in deliberately so the surface reads as woven grasscloth up close.

No sales figures are given. The collection extends the company's signature glass-bead craft — its Beadazzled line is a dense hand inlay of genuine glass beads — toward quieter Japanese-minimalist surfaces, and gives commercial interiors the richness of a handweave at Type II vinyl durability.

Ananda is wallcovering maker Maya Romanoff's Fall 2026 collection, named for the Sanskrit word from yogic philosophy describing a deep, settled kind of joy. Chief creative officer David Berkowitz says that in a world that can feel chaotic and overwhelming, the company felt a real need to create moments of calm, beauty and bliss. It consists of two wallcoverings: Zen Kanso, handcrafted in the company's Chicago studio, and Tenona II, a machine-produced Type II vinyl.

Zen Kanso celebrates Japanese minimalism through the company's oldest material signature. Thousands of tiny glass beads are encapsulated in a resilient compound on a durable non-woven ground, and an artisan sets a brush at the top edge and pulls it straight down in one steady stroke, each stroke beside the last, until the panel is covered in soft, glittering vertical lines. Associate studio creative director Jacqueline Nuzzo says the beads give the surface texture, dimension and a sense of movement, so the wall shifts as the light or the viewer shifts.

Glass beads are familiar ground for the company: its Beadazzled collection is a dense hand inlay of genuine glass beads, and Zen Kanso takes the same material somewhere quieter. Tenona II is built the opposite way: a grasscloth-spirited basketweave modelled on centuries-old Japanese paper weaving, in 12 nature-inspired colourways and tough enough for commercial interiors. The team built the irregularities of a handweave in on purpose, so the surface never feels overly uniform or manufactured.

Founder Maya Romanoff discovered dyeing as a Berkeley student after seeing a tie-dyed t-shirt at Woodstock, founded the company in 1969 as a fashion label, studied the craft of dyeing in Japan, and filled Chicago's Sun-Times Building with a hand-dyed installation in 1988 before turning to wallcoverings worked with glass beads, sea shells, gold leaf and stitching. Berkowitz says the team feels a responsibility to uphold the craftsmanship standard clients have come to expect from that history.

Each Zen Kanso panel is set by hand one brushstroke at a time, with no fixed timeframe.

Tenona II deliberately builds the irregularities of a handweave into a machine-made vinyl.

The pairing shows one idea — calm — served by opposite production logics.

It extends the founder-era glass-bead craft rather than replacing it.

One feeling can be served by opposite logics: the handmade earns calm through labour, the machine-made by manufacturing the imperfections that signal a hand. Imperfection is a designable feature.

The piece gives no sales or installation figures. Berkowitz frames the goal as providing a small sense of solitude and calm within a busy world, and says the company hopes people discover something new the closer they look.