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27th August 2018
Following on from our previous blog, we have too many beautiful William Morris designs to fit them into one blog! With our ever growing collection of William Morris designs, we wanted to show them all together with the stories behind them too. Each William Morris design and fabric has a story behind it; the naturalistic and family inspirations, the dates produced and the days of love and care that went into printing them.
William Morris Brother Rabbit was first produced in 1882. It was one of the first designs to be designed and created using the indigo-discharge method of printing. The printing process in total took around three days to complete. The process went that the cloth was dyed all over in an indigo vat which allowed a blue colour to dye the fabric all over in a uniform manner before being printed with a bleaching reagent. That would reduce the colour as much as was required for the colour of the desired design – of course this process is as much trial and error as you can imagine. The mordants were then applied to the bleached parts of the cloth and then immersed in a madder vat to give it a proper tint. Following this, the excess colour was cleaned off and then, to set the colour so that it wouldn’t run, the colours were set at boiling point by passing the fabric through soap. The cloth was then laid outside with the printed side facing upwards which allowed the design to be purified. The whole process over a three day period was a time consuming job!
We also produce William Morris Brother Rabbit in a red colourway – we love it in both colours too much to pick our favourites!
Golden Lily is one of our favourite William Morris designs, beautiful intertwining tulips, lilies and leaves within the design. With a similar name to Lily, don’t be confused – they’re two separate designs. Our licensed Morris designs are printed colour and size wise to our own specifications which best suit our products.
The last design William Morris created before his death, Compton was commissioned for Mr Lawrence Hodson’s Compton Hall in Wolverhampton. The cause of death by Morris? His physician gave the cause, “simply being William Morris, and having done more work than most ten men.” The original design actually required two sets of wooden blocks which were required to print all 28 colours.
A beautiful design that we love in the Autumn/Winter months in particular, the warm oranges giving it a comforting feel within the home.
Designed by William Morris in 1874, Lily is a beautiful design, incorporating a willow background design with lilies and wild flowers. The colours within the design are stunning and really brighten up a room, adding colour into a room and complimenting many different colour schemes due to the fact there’s so many colours within the design.
Morris himself must have really loved the design, it was the wallpaper he used to decorate his bedroom at Kelmscott Manor – his home in Lechlade, Gloucestershire.
Merton, in both blue and white and green and cream, was first produced in 1888. The design was named after their premises that Morris’ company, Morris & Co. moved to – Merton Abbey in Surrey in 1881. It was the first design that the company printed on rotary screens.
Sweet Briar was designed in 1912 as a wallpaper before being used as a fabric later on. The Sweet Briar design is a soft, almost romantic one, made up by a soft cream background with climbing rose stems throughout, in both green and soft brown. The pink Sweet Briar Roses are prominent throughout the design in an almost whimsical design.
Our products are both printed and manufactured in the United Kingdom, are licensed designs by William Morris, and are printed both size and colour-wise to our own specifications to best suit our products. If you’d like a sample of any of our fabrics to see them in more detail, please contact us and we’d be more than happy to send one to you!
Posted in News by Laura
Our William Morris Willow Bough green placemats are now back in stock! ✨ They’re a beautiful addition to the table for every meal time 🫶🏻
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🐥 William Morris month day 31 🐥 Happy Easter everyone! 🐰 Hope everyone’s having a lovely long weekend, we got beautiful Willow Bough out for a themed tablescape - not forgetting the Lidnt bunny’s and eggs! 🌿🐰
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🌷 William Morris month day 30 🌷 As we come near the end of Morris month, we’re celebrating with a fabric stack, full of beautiful licensed designs, which is your fave? 🌿 “Remember that a pattern is either right or wrong. It cannot be forgiven for blundering, as a picture may be which has otherwise great qualities in it. It is with a pattern as with a fortress, it is no stronger than its weakest point.”- William Morris 🤍
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🐭 William Morris month day 29 🐭 We’ve been loving William Morris month to celebrate Morris’s birthday month, spreading his floral magic by posting everyday - have you discovered a new favourite design of his this month? 🌿 We absolutely love these little mice and the banner by @mini_and_bob - aren’t they so lovely! 🐭🤍
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🌷William Morris Month Day 28🌷 Happy Easter weekend everyone! 🐥 We hope everyone has a lovely long bank holiday 🌿 We’re already planning some beautiful William Morris tablescapes, nothing too complex, all you need is some Morris florals, some flowers and lots of chocolate! 🐰
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🧵 William Morris month day 26 🧵 Calling all quilters; have you ever used our cotton fabric to quilt with? We’ve used them a lot and quilters and quilting groups find them a great fabric weight to quilt with to produce beautiful Morris quilts like this one by @ellejoycreations 🌿🧵🪡 If you’d like a sample of any of our designs we send them free within the UK 💌
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🌷 William Morris Month Day 26 🌷 Absolutely loving a spring time floral on the table right now, especially when paired with an Easter craft or two! 🤍
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🌿 William Morris Month Day 25 🌿 Florals on florals on florals; all of the William Morris florals just look so beautiful together and, as Morris said himself, “Have nothing in your houses that you do not know to be useful or believe to be beautiful” 🌷
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#williammorris #williammorrisdesign #williammorrisfabrics #williammorrisfabric #morrisdesign #quoteoftheday #florals #modernflorals #teatowels #preraphaelitebrotherhood #preraphaelites
🍰 William Morris Month Day 24 🍰 Happy Birthday William Morris! ✨ Born on this day in 1834, he created so many timeless designs which are still popular today 🌿 He was also an incredible poet, writer, and social activist, also creating the Kelmscott Press and he was a key figure in reviving traditional British art and textile methods of production, even opening a print works- Merton Abbey 🪴 There’s far too much to fit in an Instagram caption but his life is well worth a research if you have time! 🌷 He famously said, “I do not want art for a few any more than education for a few, or freedom for a few” - what’s your favourite quote to celebrate Morris today? 🖋️
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🐥 William Morris Month Day 23 🐥 Loving the sunshine this week for springtime 🌿 We absolutely love Willow Bough on the table in the sunshine paired with spring blooms 🌷
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#williammorris #williammorrismonth #williammorrisdesign #williammorrisfabric #williammorrisfabrics #fabric #willowbough #easter #eastertables
🌷 William Morris Month Day 22🌷 A themed table is always our favourite, we’ve been loving setting the table lately with an Easter theme- especially when it means we can eat the eggs after! 🐣✨
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🌷 William Morris Month Day 21 🌷 As a small business ourselves we absolutely love celebrating other small businesses, today for Morris month we’re loving @ellejoycreations beautiful products, go check out her page to see them all!🌷🌿
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#williammmorrismonth #williammorris #williammorrisdesign #williammorrisfabric #williammorrisfabrics #fabric #fabrics #smallbusiness #uksmallbusiness #preraphaelite
🌿 William Morris Day 20 🌿 William Morris fact of the day; did you know he founded the Kelmscott Press? 🖋️ He wrote of the venture – “Here is a new craft to conquer and to perfect.” Printing began at the press in Spring 1891 🪴 He designed multiple fonts including “Golden” Roman typeface and “Troy” Gothic type along with “Chaucer” and he worked to create beautiful books in regards to their designs which took into account their type, image and decorative elements – you can see beautiful examples of what he achieved today if you do a quick search on the Kelmscott Press- it’s well worth a Google! 🌷
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🌷 William Morris Month Day 19🌷 Happy first day of spring everyone! 🪴 We celebrated in our favourite way; coffee and cake of course! 🍰 Now we love florals all year round of course, but especially love adding in even more this time of year to reflect the blooms in the garden 🌷 What’s your favourite Morris design this time of year? 🌿
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📝 William Morris Month Day 18 📝 Did you know that as well as being an incredible designer, William Morris was also a brilliant writer and poet; have you read any of his writing? What’s your favourite quote? 🌷🌿
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#williammorrismonth #williammorris #williammorrisfabric #williammorrisfabrics #morris #strawberrythief #quotesaboutlife #quotestoliveby #quotes
☀️ William Morris Month Day 17 ☀️ The sunshine today has made us feel so excited for spring, it’s almost officially here! 🪴 This William Morris bunting is the dreamiest backdrop to all the spring summer days in the garden, it’s by @ellejoycreations - isn’t it fabulous!🌷
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🐰 William Morris Month Day 16 🐰 A Sunday spent Easter decorating, these cute little bunnies were a craft a few years back and they are always a firm favourite to bring out this time of year to hang on our Easter tree 🐥 Have you started decorating or eating eggs yet? 🐣
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🍓 William Morris Month Day 15 🍓 Absolutely can’t wait for the summer months to get our Strawberry Thief picnic basket and blanket back out- if you missed this craft we have a DIY on our website blog, along with a lot of other craft ideas and how-to blogs ☺️
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🍓 William Morris Month Day 14 🍓 Strawberry Thief was inspired by William Morris’s watching the thrushes under the strawberry nets at the stunning @kelmscottmanor 🌿 May Morris conjured up this scene when speaking of the design, “You can imagine my Father going out in the early morning and watching the rascally thrushes at work on the fruit beds and telling the fanned who growls ‘I’d like to wring their necks!’ that no bird in the garden must be touched. There were certainly more birds than strawberries in spite of attempts at protection. And the walls of the little dining-room are hung with this note of the June garden and the little lords of it.” 🍓 What a lovely insight into the Morris family life! 🥰
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🌿 William Morris Month Day 13 🌿 A little Bertie is interested in looking at our fresh florals on the table today, the theme of flower arranging class this week was “childhood memories” so of course Barbie was our theme! 🐕🦺🩷 Featuring our beautiful William Morris Strawberry Thief on the table today 🌿
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