Intellectual Property Magazine
Curver Luxembourg v Home Expressions
Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit - 12 September 2019
Mark J Thronson, Blank Rome
In the recent case of Curver Luxembourg v HomeExpressions
1 the US Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit
brought welcome clarity to an issue of importance in US design patent law.
In the past, in the midst of some uncertainty, the actual words of the claim of
a US design patent have been treated mainly as a formality, with little to no
effect on the scope of the patent. In both infringement litigation and design
patent procurement, claim scope has been determined by focusing on what is
shown in the design patent drawings, not on the text of the claim itself. Curver
Luxembourg represents a shift away from that approach. According to the
court, “claim language”, not just the drawings, “limits the scope of the
claimed design” and “it is inappropriate to ignore” the text of a US design
patent.
2