Into the Wylde

THE bed — with a headboard dotted in dozens of whitewashed cow skulls and a marble base weighing in at 5 tons — is still en route from Paris, where it was unveiled during fashion week in February as part of an expanded new world of Thomas Wylde.

The line famous for its skull-print scarves is fleshing out into a full-blown collection: yard-high marble skull planters and 1,000-thread-count sheets elegantly embroidered with crosses, cashmere blankets and coats, limited-edition sneakers and studded jeans, diamond-encrusted watches and fox fur jackets.

And that bed. Nevermind its $60,000 price tag. “You don’t even want to know what it cost to ship. It’s on a freighter somewhere until we decide where to put it,” laughingly explains its creator, Paula Thomas, the model-turned-designer behind Thomas Wylde. She is also among the stylish new denizens in downtown L.A.’s toy district, having set up camp in a slickly renovated factory across from the Sci-Arc campus.

A fashion brand insisting it’s a “lifestyle” source is pretty much de rigueur these days. So why shouldn’t Thomas Wylde parlay those black-and-white skull-printed swatches cinched around the heads and bags of most-watched style setters Sienna Miller, Lindsay Lohan and the like. Now those skulls are repeating across teeny bikinis and chiffon baby doll shifts in yet another rollout: a cruise collection.

But it was never Thomas’ intention to become a one-note brand. “Don’t get me wrong, I love my skulls and I love my fashion,” the Welsh native says in her characteristic fast clip. “But I also get slightly bored. I love interiors. I love architecture. I’d love to do hotels. Oh! I just got offered to do [Formula One racer] Ralf Schumacher’s yacht.”

The bed — and a 3-ton, $48,000 skull-footed bathtub — are the crowning features in the new home collection, which Thomas is introducing this fall after only three seasons in business. Before striking out in 2005 with a line reflecting her own edgy, luxe rock style, she collaborated with Julien McDonald through his tenure at Givenchy and guided L.A. designer Jenni Kayne in her inaugural year. The label is named for her grandfather Robert Thomas and great-grandmum Catherine Wylde.

Because a catalog is so very ordinary, Thomas Wylde has produced a coffee-table book, filled with sumptuous images of glamazons fully primped in Thomas’ sophisticated ready-to-wear — pencil skirts, ruched lambskin coats and Chantilly lace blousons — in the dizzying heat of Death Valley. The 2,500 copies will go to clients and friends.

An order is already in for the tub from some “mad Japanese client.” Like all good rock ‘n’ roll, Thomas Wylde is, as they say, big in Japan. So too in Moscow, Hong Kong and Dubai and internationally in 106 stores, including Barneys New York and Harvey Nichols. Maxfield in West Hollywood exclusively stocks its studded jeans and cashmere hoodies for toddlers.

“People were so quick to say ‘Thomas Wylde, that’s just skulls,’ ” Thomas says.

What boneheads.