FAQs

Your Cart

Close
Paper Plane Your order qualifies for free standard delivery
Subtotal £0.00
Delivery £0.00
Order Total £0
Checkout Securely

From a story William Morris read to his daughters to an iconic design; Brother Rabbit

22nd May 2017

Welcome to our new blog series which revolves around all our current designs before we launch our new one! Below is a sneak peak of the new design as well as an insight into how colours are chosen for a new design of ours. Throughout the process, we work closely with the printers and receive many strike offs to make sure it’s perfect. Our new design is excitingly close to being perfected so stay tuned!

Our Brother Rabbit design was first produced in May 1882. It was one of nineteen designs registered at the Patent Office between 1881-1882 by Morris- seventeen of these were designed for the indigo- discharge method of printing. This method stands in stark contrast to the printing we see today on machines; this took three days to complete. The cloth was submerged in an indigo vat in order to dye it all over to a uniform blue colour. Then it was bleached with a bleaching reagent to reduce the colour to the desired shade of blue for the base colour. Mordants are then applied to the bleached parts and then the cloth immersed in a madder vat to give it the proper tint. The excess colour was then cleaned off and to ensure the colours on the fabric won’t run once produced, they were set at boiling point by passing the fabric through soap. Laid outside with the printed side face up, the white of the design was purified to finish the job- a laborious job to create a work of art; worth it though to see the beautiful and intricate designs Morris produced.

The Uncle Remus Stories were written by J.C. Harris and Morris read them to his children Jenny and May at their home Kelmscott Manor. The birds in the design were drawn by Morris’ close friend Philip Webb.

Nowadays, our products are both printed and manufactured in the UK, are licensed designs by William Morris, and are printed both size and colour-wise to our own specifications to best suit our products.

Below are a few of our Brother Rabbit design items- our tote bags fitted in perfectly in Venice, but our full range is viewable here- it would look great on your table and throughout your kitchen in accessories this summer time!

Related Articles

Post Title

Have you seen our William Morris Oven Gloves?

We hope you have seen our collection of William Morris oven gloves, but if not, why not stick around and let us show you them!...

Post Title

John Ruskin Exhibition in Sheffield

John Ruskin Exhibition in Sheffield This is likely to be of great interest to William Morris fans.  There is a fascinating exhibition entitled  Force of...

Post Title

William Morris Stained Glass at Bradford Cathedral

In our last post, we talked about the exhibition running at Bradford Cathedral celebrating William Morris. It couldn't be left unsaid however, the beauty of the...

Mid week tables require; a vase of gorgeous fresh flowers, as many sweet treats as you can get your hands on, and of course, a gorgeous tablecloth set- this Willow Bough blue is one of our all time favourite William Morris designs, it’s utterly timeless and so beautiful 🌿
〰️
The table details;
Willow Bough blue napkins- £16.99
Willow Bough tablecloths- starting at £29.99 depending on size 
•
•
•
#williammorris #williammorrisdesign #willowbough #englishdesign #myfloralhome
A little update from us 🇬🇧
From 1st July, our product prices will be increasing due to continued rises in manufacturing and material costs.
We’ve worked hard to absorb these increases for as long as possible, but to continue providing the quality you expect from us, a small price adjustment is now necessary.
Every product we create is proudly printed and manufactured here in the UK, using high-quality materials and processes that ensure a finish we’re proud of. Our fabrics are all digitally printed to give a crisp finish.
If you’ve been thinking about placing an order, now is the perfect time — all orders placed before 1st July will be at our current prices.
To thank you for your support, we’re offering an exclusive discount before the new prices take effect.
Use code: thankyou
Enjoy 10% off your order until 14th June
This is the perfect opportunity to place your order at current prices and enjoy an additional saving before the increase.
Thank you for supporting a UK small business and for choosing quality. We truly appreciate every order ❤️
•
•
•
#uksmallbiz #madeintheuk #williammorris #fabricstore #floralfabric
Gorgeous postbox 📮 If you’d like a free sample of any of our fabrics just send us a message and we’ll get them sent out to you 💌 If you’re ordering from abroad, we will always take the parcel to the post office to make sure we’re comparing different postage methods to get the best postage prices for you- we’re wanting to spread the floral goodness global! Today I pottered to the post office to send a lovely pvc apron to Australia which is amazing that Morris is well known world wide! 🐨🦘🇦🇺 
•
•
•
#williammorris #williammorrisdesign #smallukbusiness #fabricdesign #postboxesofinstagram
The best season is peony season 🫶🏻 Our favourite flowers, having peonies blooming in the house is always the best ✨ This is our William Morris Merton design, the most stunning blue and white pattern is so timeless ✨
•
•
•
#williammorris #williammorrisdesign #wmorris #morrisdesign #blueandwhitedecor
Lily is one of our favourite William Morris designs, it’s such a beautiful botanical design with all those willow leaves in the background 🌿 
•
•
•
#williammorris #williammorrisfabric #lily #floraltable #floralmagic
Happy Strawberry Thief day! 🍓 On this day in 1883, Morris registered this beautiful design, isn’t it amazing that all these years later, it’s still as timeless as ever now more popular than ever and decorating homes across the world 🐦‍⬛ 
•
•
•
#strawberrythief #williammorris #williammorrisdesign #birddesign #floralfabric
We want to say a huge THANK YOU to all our lovely customers who have been so patient with us whilst our website checkout has been all in a tizzy - and thank you for your orders on another platform, we appreciate you keeping us going as a small business- but, we’re back up and running now so please use code: THANKYOU at checkout for 15% off until Sunday 🫶🏻✨ (song was me when we finally got tech issues fixed 🫠😂)
•
•
•
#williammorrisfabric #williammorris #wmorris #floralteatowel #williammorrisdesign
📣 This fabric is on a big sale! 📣 Our red Strawberry Thief drill fabric is currently on sale for £15 a metre 🍓 Our drill fabric is a slightly heavier weight and weave than our heavyweight fabric and is perfect for light upholstery, curtain making and more 🪡🧵 It won’t be on sale long so grab yourself some whilst you can ✨
•
•
•
#williammorris #williammorrisdesign #strawberrythief #ukfabric #curtainfabric
The soundtrack to our day- our fabric cutter! 🎼 If you ever order fabric from us this is how we get our cuts so straight ☺️ Did you know that we sell our fabrics by the half meter, so however big or small your project is, we’ve got fabric for you ☺️ This is our gorgeous William Morris Strawberry Thief blue design, it’s very often on our cutting table as it’s so popular! Do you prefer it in red or in blue? 🍓 
•
•
•
#williammorris #fabricbytheyard #fabricbymeter #floralfabric #ukfabric
Replacing all normal eggs with chocolate ones for the foreseeable future 🐣 Brother Rabbit Green on the table always looks so beautiful, we just love this new colour way in this gorgeous William Morris design ✨
•
•
•
#williammorris #wmorris #eastertable #floraltable #eastertablescape
Gorgeous flowers this weekend 🤍 We can’t get over the beautiful tulips 🌷 Brother Rabbit blue on the table, do you prefer it in the blue, red or green? 🌿
•
•
•
#williammorris #wmorris #preraphaelites #flowerpowerfabric #flowers
A moment for the greens 🌿 We know sometimes it’s hard imagining different designs together for projects whether you’re quilting with tonal colours or mix matching curtains and cushions, the things you can do with our William Morris fabrics are endless, so seeing them together you can see how beautifully they pair together ✨ We’ll post the blues next so you can see them together too! 🤍 Message us if you’d like a sample of anything, we send them free in the UK 📮
•
•
•
#williammorris #williammorrisdesign #williammorrisfabrics #quiltingfabric #ukfabric