Some People Loose Their Dignity Witgh Popular Arts Willam Morris
For designer William Morris, beauty was key to happiness
© Victoria and Albert Museum, London
Two ways to read the story
British designer William Morris is today best known for his lush, garden-inspired patterns for wall coverings, but his lifework encompassed far more than mere decoration. A gorgeously illustrated book, titled simply "William Morris," edited past Anna Mason and released by the Victoria and Albert Museum, offers a detailed portrait of the human being, his work, and the values that fueled both.
An outlier among his contemporaries, Morris was dismayed by the increased mechanization that he felt robbed workers of their nobility. He likewise believed that mass-produced appurtenances were inherently junior and that their shoddiness reflected poorly on the household for which they were purchased. His best-known dictum was "have nothing in your houses that you lot do not know to be useful, or believe to exist cute."
He set out to address both worker breach and consumer taste through a revival of the craft traditions that had flourished in medieval Europe from the time of the building of the bang-up cathedrals. As one essayist in the book puts it: "For him, beauty was a 'positive necessity,' not a luxury but essential to human happiness."
Why We Wrote This
Luxury goods and social reform don't frequently come from the aforementioned place. For cloth artisan, tastemaker, and social reformer William Morris, his values were inseparable from his piece of work.
Behind the exquisite floral wallpaper lurks a social reformer. British designer William Morris (1834-96) is today best known for his lush, garden-inspired patterns for wall coverings, but his lifework encompassed far more than than mere decoration. He sought naught less than to overturn what he considered the deleterious effects of industrialization on Victorian gild. And his artistic influence continues today, not simply at London'due south Victoria and Albert Museum, an establishment he helped shape, but also as inspiration to contemporary artists.
A gorgeously illustrated book, titled merely "William Morris," edited by Anna Mason and released by the Victoria and Albert Museum, offers a detailed portrait of the human being, his piece of work, and the values that fueled both. Even the dust jacket is embellished with 1 of Morris' elegant designs from the museum's all-encompassing archives of decorative art. The book, with essays by more than a dozen experts, lays out the varied aspects of Morris' life as an artist, designer, poet, educator, entrepreneur, preservationist, and political activist. Each role fed the others, and nourished his restless and fertile listen.
Morris was considered an outlier by his contemporaries, who were busy either extolling Britain'due south growing industrial might or profiting directly from it. Morris was dismayed by the increased mechanization that he felt robbed workers of their nobility and the potential for creativity in their piece of work. He also believed that mass-produced appurtenances were inherently inferior, that their manufacture led to waste product and environmental degradation, and that their shoddiness reflected poorly on the household for which they were purchased. His all-time-known dictum was "have nothing in your houses that you exercise not know to be useful, or believe to be beautiful."
Why We Wrote This
Luxury appurtenances and social reform don't often come from the same place. For material artisan, tastemaker, and social reformer William Morris, his values were inseparable from his work.
He set out to address both worker alienation and consumer taste through a revival of the craft traditions that had flourished in medieval Europe from the fourth dimension of the building of the great cathedrals. These church edifices were complete works of art, and showcased the labor of hundreds of skilled workers, from stone carvers to stained-glass makers. Morris, who considered becoming an architect, visited cathedrals in France and Belgium equally a young man, and was profoundly moved past the experience. He was inspired by how all the arts came together into a glorious whole, with each worker's individuality all the same apparent and yet blended into the overall design. It filled him with hope.
© Victoria and Albert Museum, London
As part of replicating this medieval-artisan model in Victorian England, Morris decided to learn the skills involved. Over the years, he mastered painting and drawing, stained-drinking glass making, textile making, weaving, and bookbinding. "He never designed anything he did non know how to produce with his ain hands," wrote an early biographer. In 1860, Morris and a grouping of influential creative person friends formed a company that sold custom furnishings and a full range of decorating services.
The company'due south painted cabinetry, stained glass, and wall hangings portrayed stories from Chaucer and King Arthur, along with characters from Greek mythology and the Bible. Morris and his cohorts chose potent, saturated colors, specially blues and reds, for their designs. The colors were inspired by those Morris had seen in the stained-glass windows of the cathedrals he visited. Before long, wealthy clients – from British nobles to American industrialists – began commissioning appurtenances from the company.
With the success of his venture, Morris faced a conundrum. He was keenly aware that the effects were as well expensive for ordinary people, and this did non sit well with his values. In the 1870s, he took a two-pronged approach: He became active in socialist causes on behalf of working-class people and besides took control of the company, expanding it to include the grooming of workers and the selling of less expensive, but still high quality, merchandise. Morris oversaw all aspects from design to production, and from management to marketing. His London retail shop was likely one of the earliest interior blueprint showrooms, with products arranged to demonstrate how pieces looked together. Morris & Co. became known for high-quality, well-fabricated appurtenances.
© Victoria and Albert Museum, London
Morris' political opinions did non seem to hurt his business. His designs conveyed a love of the natural world and a buoyancy that continued to appeal to clients – and still attracts admirers today. The patterns of flowers, vines, leaves, birds, and other animals suffuse his designs with joy. Many of Morris' wallpaper and fabric designs accept never gone out of production, although now they are auto printed, rather than cake printed by paw.
The name Arts and crafts was given to the manner of architecture and furnishings that Morris developed, and the movement spread to northern Europe and North America in the late 19th and early 20th century. It influenced compages as well as interiors, although in profoundly simplified form in the United states of america. Frank Lloyd Wright's early prairie-style homes, with their stained drinking glass and custom-designed furnishings, reflect an American variation on the style. In California, the architecture business firm of Greene & Greene designed structures that became known equally American Craftsman. In upstate New York, Gustav Stickley made furniture that became synonymous with Craft.
The social and political component of Morris' work, and especially his message of reform, did non make the jump to America, one of the book's essayists explains, although Morris was a hero to at to the lowest degree two important social reformers, Jane Addams and Ellen Gates Starr, who founded Hull House in Chicago to offer community services, literacy classes, and arts and crafts workshops to newly arrived immigrants. The two women kept a portrait of Morris in a place of honor on the wall. Although he never traveled to the U.s., his girl, May, was able to visit Hull Business firm.
Morris certainly inveighed confronting the social ills of his fourth dimension, but he never lost his positive outlook. His critiques of injustice were "always balanced past an optimistic and inspiring vision of what a better future might look like," according to another essayist. "For him, beauty was a 'positive necessity', not a luxury but essential to human being happiness."
April Austin is the Monitor's books editor.
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