textile Archives - Page 5 of 9 - William Morris Gallery

Details

Dimensions: 528.3 x 119
Object Type: textile
Technique: power-loom jacquard woven
Catalogue number: F420
Designer: Dearle, John Henry (1859 - 1932)
Retailer: Morris & Co.
Manufacturer: Alexander Morton & Co.
Credit notes: WMG purchase, 2000

Helena was designed by Henry Dearle and registered in 1891. It was woven for Morris & Co. by Alexander Morton & Co. of Darvel, Scotland. The pattern combines artichoke flowers with a background of acanthus leaves and fritilliary. This length was purchased by the poet John Betjaman at the 1939 sale of Kelmscott Manor (the Morris family’s country retreat in Gloucestershire). The original design is also in the Gallery’s collection (see A471); another working drawing is in the Huntington Museum, California.

Details

Dimensions: 44.5 x 95.5
Object Type: textile
Material: cotton
Technique: block-printed
Catalogue number: F410
Designer: Morris, William, 1834, 1896
Manufacturer: Morris & Co.
Credit notes: Purchased from Haslam & Whiteway, 1998

‘Eyebright’ was designed by William Morris in 1883. The pattern was achieved using the indigo-discharge process, whereby the cotton was dyed in indigo blue and the pattern then extracted and over printed. The small ‘net’ repeat is formed of white eyebright flowers and yellow buttercups dyed with weld, a natural dye derived from a flower. The pattern was also available in just blue and white. The pattern was initailly intended to be used as a lining for Morris & Co.’s heavy wool curtains (two widths matched the width of a curtains) but was used as a furnishing fabric in its own right. May Morris claimed that Eyebright, and another pattern Borage ‘were small patterns intended for dress’, revealing Morris’s intention to expand the business beyond interior fabrics. A dress of Eyebright made around 1900 is in the The Art Gallery of Australia’s collection (996A38).

Details

Date: 1888
Dimensions: 140 x 94
Object Type: textile
Material: linen
Technique: block-printed
Catalogue number: F403
Designer: Dearle, John Henry (1859 - 1932)
Manufacturer: Morris & Co.
Credit notes: Purchased from Michael Whiteway, 1998

Trent is one of series of textile designs produced by Morris & Co in the late 1880s named after rivers. John Henry Deale designed ‘Trent’ in 1888, the pattern features tulips, sunflowers and roses on an indigo background. This example is the end of a bolt of fabric and so is possible to see how the pattern was handprinted with woodblocks to form the pattern repeat. The edge and selvedges are printed with Morris & Co’s stamp.

Details

Date: c.1868
Dimensions: 85.1 x 233.7
Object Type: textile
Material: woven wool
Technique: block-printed
Catalogue number: F399
Retailer: Morris, Marshall, Faulkner & Co.
Manufacturer: Thomas Clarkson of Bannister Hall
Credit notes: Transfer from Victoria and Albert Museum, 1980

This was the first textile design to be sold by Morris’s firm, Morris, Marshall, Faulkner and Co., around 1868. Morris copied the pattern from a traditional Bannister Hall print of the 1830’s. The blocks were printed with aniline dyes by Clarksons of Bannister Hall for Morris, and sold throughout the life of Morris & Co. In the twentieth century the design saw a revival in the increased popularity of floral chintz patterns and there is evidence that the design was available until 1940. This is an early example printed onto wool and cotton and made into a curtain, a companion piece is in the Victoria and Albert Museum, London (T.37-1979).

Object Type: textile

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