In Memoriam Sally McQuillan 1954–2024

Sally McQuillan, founder and designer of Raoul Textiles, passed away peacefully at her home in Santa Barbara on Sunday, July 14. She was a beloved mother, daughter, sister and artist. Her talent and fierce determination took her company from a Quonset hut on Salsipuedes Street to an international force, and her unique genius transformed American textile design.

Sally was born in Wichita, Kansas, to Harriett and Robert Grossman. She grew up in Virginia and Florida, and then studied at the Art Institute of Chicago. Although she majored in painting, she was more interested in depicting the wallpaper and fabrics behind her subjects.

In 1975, she came to Santa Barbara to visit her sister Peggy at UCSB. She returned to Chicago, stayed for a week, then flew back to Santa Barbara and never left. She got a job at the Little Acorn nursery and met her late husband, Tim, at his restaurant, the Rhythm Café. He took her order and slipped her his number with the bill. They married in 1981 and had two children, Madeleine and Gene.

Sally was an extraordinary person; full of ideas and drive, she and Tim started Raoul with a library book on screen printing and a T-shirt screen print. With their children literally on their backs, Sally and Tim began printing development fabric for surfwear and clothing brands – Quicksilver, Billabong, Nike – and soon outgrew their tiny Quonset hut. They moved the factory to Parker Way and took on larger and larger orders, with printers working in shifts and hundreds of yards of fabric in wild 1980s neon colors hanging from the rafters.

It was around this time that Sally began designing her own line of prints – first for children’s clothing, then handbags, and finally for interiors, which she would put her stamp on. She printed on linen, which she loved for its rustic elegance, and she insisted on always printing on site and by hand. Her designs were painterly, traditional but fresh, with a surprising sense of color and scale.

Sally never followed trends, she set them. When people asked how she started a design, she talked about the lines – she loved drawing and the grace of her hand is unmistakable. She never used a computer for art work; she drew each leaf and paisley pattern with her doggedly maintained Rapidograph pens. She was inspired by the things she loved, and she loved so many things.

Sally brought the world to life. She spent hours in her greenhouse, planting seeds while her beloved dog, Fergus, lay at her feet. She was an excellent, ambitious cook and loved entertaining people. She set her tables with amazing floral arrangements and knew the name of every plant. She had a sense of when something was right, but also how to do it right; when to increase the scale, shift a subject, brighten a color, and how to lighten a room.

Sally created a magical world for her family and for the many, many artists and artisans who worked at Raoul over the years. Her children were always with her; Madeleine and Gene grew up in the factory, climbing down 100-foot-long tables, causing chaos in the paint department, and taking naps in laundry carts loaded with clothes fresh out of the dryer. After Tim’s death in 2000, she continued the business, printing only her own designs in the factory (now on Los Aguajes Avenue) and expanding her business to national and international showrooms, printing fabrics for celebrities, hotels, her children’s class projects, and – her favorite assignment – Obama’s White House.

She was warm, generous, curious, stylish and tough. Sally inspired everyone she met; her enthusiasm and creativity were unbridled. She had an unwavering sense of possibility and believed that you can (and should) do anything yourself. She felt so lucky to have spent her life doing what she loved, surrounded by her family, and she was so proud when her children joined the business.

Sally continued to work and design as long as her illness allowed. After chemotherapy, she went straight back to the light table, took a lunch break, and talked to her children about work.

Many in Santa Barbara may have met Sally at the famous Raoul factory sale; many may have seen her fabrics on their couches, hanging in their windows, or stacked in the closet waiting to be made into a quilt. If so, you know how much joy and life her textiles bring to a home. You can feel the integrity of the process, the sense of history and unique vision, the way they draw your eye and reflect the warmth and light of the room.

That was Sally.