Field Report: How to Tame a Tiger (Rug)

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In the franchise Field Report, SPY investigates the rise in popularity of a product by reporting on how the phenomenon came to be.

Trends ebb and flow, but in interior design, maximalism is currently on the uptick. And animal prints are enjoying a brash, scene-chewing moment – at least according to Sasha Bikoff, an AD100 interior designer based in New York City. 

“Animal prints, in my perspective, are classic,” she tells SPY, adding that she’s seen a “resurgence” of interest in them from clients lately. “We see animal prints throughout history, and it always kind of epitomized this style.” 

In particular, the popularity of Tibetan tiger rugs represents a vintage glamor merging with a more minimalist, playful sensibility, a la Urban Outfitters. There’s currently a surplus of Tibetan tiger rugs on Etsy, with a search producing over 5,000 results. On sites like 1stDibs or Chairish you’ll find more tasteful, abstract designs; there’s also hundreds of hyperchromatic tiger cutouts that look like if Mufasa took shrooms. 

So there’s a market somewhere, and likely one drawn to the younger, pop-art look. Think of it as more Coming Soon New York than Burt Reynolds lounging on a bearskin in the 70s. 

“I think that this kind of rug is kind of popular right now because it lends itself to a more global, bohemian look,” Bikoff says. 

Animal rugs aren’t anything new, but the current interest in them is part of a design fascination with the bold and attention-grabbing, rather than intricate, smaller details; as examples, prints are cropping up in trendy bars throughout New York City. The Nines, on Great Jones Street, uses a cheetah print carpet, for instance, and 169 Bar – a downtown favorite – recently refelted their pool table with a leopard print.

“We love an animal print moment in a room,” Lanier Hicks, an interior designer based in New York City, tells SPY. “Going with this traditional, graphic motif makes it feel a little more worldly and collected, a little less 70s mirrored coke room.” 

Isabelle Dahlin, an interior designer based in Los Angeles, tells SPY that the Tibetan Tiger rug and its ilk are not remotely her taste. But for those enamored by an eye-catching piece to the point it tests friendships, she advises embracing the aesthetic. 

“I personally don’t use them,” she says of the rugs. “You have to either make it the pièce de résistance of the room and show it off like you’re proud of it, or be tongue-in-cheek about it.” 

That means leaning into the opulence, she says: darker walls, some gold throughout the space, pillows that pick up colors from the rug – making a “jewelry box of a room.” 

Bikoff said that growing interest in animal prints shows that “people are kind of reverting back more design from the 80s.” 

But balance is important. If you have a red door in the living room, Dahlin said that she would put red somewhere else – a decorative pillow, for instance – just to calm it down. Similarly, taking a color from a tiger rug – the red of a tongue, the orange of the hide – and matching a throw blanket to it, for instance, achieves balance. 

Bikoff favors animal prints on silk velvet, saying that they look “really great paired with jewel tones, mirrors, and glass,” as well as brass and metals. Her way of leaning into the “wow-factor” would involve Italian influences, she says. 

“But if you’re more of a minimalist and a modernist, it could also be used like a woven pattern, like a mid-century Scandinavian chair, and take on a more naturalistic modernistic look.”

But Dahlin says not “to shy away from the opulence.” 

“People who like to have fun with design who are not afraid to be themselves, I appreciate them,” she said – although she would still try to convince any client who wants a Tibetan tiger rug that it’s ‘a very unusual piece’ that doesn’t bring about tranquility.”  

That’s just one designer’s opinion, though. Bikoff embraces the chaos. 

Animal print rugs “have a sort of sexy nature to them,” she says. “I love them in a kind of dark and sultry environment, where it enhances the motifs and that kind of design.”