It feels like another end of an era for Metrorail: WMATA put out a press release today announcing that it is testing new wool fabric seat covers for use in its next order of rail cars. The change comes after over 30 years of naugahyde seat covers, which came exclusively in brown and orange up until 2001, when Metro first introduced blue, sand and burgundy colors as well.

“The new fabric is what we will be passing along to the next generation of Metrorail riders,” said Dave Kubicek, Metro’s Assistant General Manager for Metrorail.

Luckily, for those of you who are just a little saddened by this news, the wool fabrics being tested out have fantastically silly names! To start with, there are two types, “aura” and “vigor,” and each comes in different designs. The aura fabric comes in blue dots, red dots, and blue squares (pictured above). The vigor fabric comes in “balls and seals” and “gray rainbow.” Too bad “unicorns” and “purple horseshoes” weren’t available.

Metro also released the following soundless video images for use by the media of the seat covers being swapped out. In the video you can see all of the different designs; I think I might like the red dots the best, but will have to wait until I encounter the seat covers in person to make a final call. Right now, the new designs are only in two rail cars, #6026 and 6027, but after three months, the fabrics will be installed on two more, #6014 and 6015.