STYLEBOOK
HIDDEN GEM
Fabric Fetish
Spinning a new yarn at The Interior Alternative By Waynette Goodson • Photograph by Amy Freeman
T
iffany Janovak loves fabric. She once had a 380-square-foot apartment in New York with three closets, and one of them held nothing but remnants and bolts of fabric. Originally from Denver, Janovak “got conned” by a girlfriend to move to New York after graduating with an English degree from the University of Colorado. “I thought I would go into publishing,” she says. Instead, she hit the pavement as a receptionist at Nautica and parlayed that position into an assistant merchandising job at Crystal Brands (Speedo, Christian Dior, Hathaway). “Then I got the call back to Nautica and got promoted to assistant merchandiser working with designers in ties, loungewear, dress shirts—all men’s.” Before long, she found herself “living the dream” at Ralph Lauren. “It was aspirational and inspirational,” she recalls. “You want to achieve those things: the glorious home by the beach with the blue-and-white-striped sofa and the linen drapes and the rattan. Ralph Lauren always said, ‘Let’s live the dream!’” She spent 26 years in New York, 21 of them with Ralph Lauren, beginning in the men’s division. “That’s where Mr.
Fall 2017
Lauren started, in neckties,” Janovak says. “At the time, men were wearing them narrow, and he reinvented them. He made them wider and out of home furnishings fabric.” After four years in neckties, she moved to the home design division where she would eventually become the senior design director. “I worked in home design for 17 years, and bedding and bath was always the No. 1 business driver,” she says. “I’d go to Greenville, South Carolina, to run sheets and towels in the mill. I loved being in a textile mill; it was fascinating!” Janovak was buying fabrics for Ralph Lauren furniture five years ago — when life took an interesting turn. She met her future husband, Kyle Klawetter. “I resigned my job in New York and moved to High Point,” she says beaming. “I bought my first house and my first car!” Career-wise, she experienced another whopper of a change — moving from wholesale to retail at the helm of The Interior Alternative, a company that operates six discount outlets from California to Delaware. The Interior Alternative’s parent company, Loomcraft Textiles, bought the behemoth in February 2016 for $6 million. “I’ve been on the wholesaler side for most of my career, and this is a showroom that’s open to the public,” Janovak says.
“Life is all about reinvention,” says veteran fabric industry guru, Tiffany Janovak
SEASONS • STYLE & DESIGN 19