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11th March 2019
There’s so much to know about William Morris; in his sixty two years, he managed to achieve so much and leave such a legacy. It’s impossible to summarise it all in one blog; artist, designer, poet, writer, explorer, the list goes on. But did you know these things about Morris…
1. His nickname was Topsy. This was because of his hair that they thought was reminiscent of a characters in Uncle Tom’s Cabin.
2. Morris is well known for being a socialist. He famously said, “…I do not want art for a few; any more than education for a few; or freedom for a few… ” and by the end of there 1870s, Morris was very involved in political activism. In 1883, he joined H.M. Hyndman’s Socialist League. He didn’t want to unify all the socialist groups within England as Hyndman wanted to. He therefore helped to form the new Socialist League – even becoming the editor of its journal. In 1885, he was actually arrested for disorderly conduct during a socialist demonstration (he was later discharged.)
3. If you take a look through Morris’ designs, you’ll note that his main influence for designs was nature. Taking elements of nature from animals in Strawberry Thief and Brother Rabbit to flowers in Lily and plants and trees like in Willow Bough. He loved taking walks in the countryside by his home and it was a huge point of inspiration for him
4. Along with all his other achievements, did you know William Morris set up his own printing press? The Kelmscott Press was set up as another of Morris’s attempts to keep a traditional art form going in the face of industrialisation. The art of the books you can see that he printed were stunning; he really wanted everything from the font to the details to reflect the art of the words. In 1891, Morris rented a cottage near Kelmscott House where he would set up three printing presses. He designed and manufactured editions of over 50 books – printing over 18,000 volumes from those three presses. The authors of these included his own work and those of Keats, Shelley, Tennyson, Coleridge, Swinburne and Rossetti. These were works he loved and was inspired by.
5. In 1860, Morris and his wife Jane moved into their home Red House. The architect on the project was friend Philip Webb who worked with Morris on his dream home. They spent the following two years decorating the home to their taste, in doing so they enlisted help from their friends on the artistic scene. The result was a stunning showcase of design; murals on the walls, hand embroidered fabrics and details that would have rivalled even the most decadent of homes. The ‘joy in collective labour’ that occurred during this time, coupled with the fact Morris was unhappy that there was nothing on the market that he could buy that he felt was beautiful enough to be in his home was the prompt for The Firm. In 1861, Morris and his artistic friends decided to create their own interiors business. All had varied skills and so they wanted to make it a joy in their skills and passions coming together to create stunning interior furnishings for peoples homes. Of course – it would also be rebelling against industrialisation at the time by using skilled craftsmen. ‘The Firm’ as it was lovingly referred to was actually called Morris, Marshall, Faulkner & Co. and when it was disbanded, became Morris & Co. – Morris’s legacy.
It was so hard for us to pair this down to only five facts! There was so much for us to choose from to talk about within this blog. But, if you’re interested in learning more about Morris, please make sure you read all our other blogs!
Posted in William Morris by Laura
Happy first day of Spring 🌷what’s your favourite thing about spring? 🌱 Ours is of course all the stunning flowers blooming all around us 🪴 To get 15% off our website to bring some florals indoors, use code; SPRING at checkout on our website 🤍
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Our fat quarters are ideal for quilting or patchwork projects, in all our licensed William Morris designs we also sell them in bundles 🌿 Our website has 15% off everything at the moment with code; SPRING 🌷
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A bit of a different one today, and we’re very amateur so don’t zoom in on our planting too much, but isn’t spring lovely tidying up the greenhouse ready to plant in? 🌱 Next up is getting some tomato plants and might even take on a dahlia or two! 🤍 If you’re a gardener and know how to keep this grape vine alive, do let us know how 😂
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Celebrating International Women’s Day today 🤍 As a female founded and run business, it’s always important for us to look at the women throughout history that have been empowered and made a difference. Few have made such a difference than May Morris, not only an expert in embroidery and design, she ran the embroidery department at her father’s business, Morris & Co. She also founded the Women’s Guild of Arts as the Art Workers Guild did not admit women - like her father was a true pioneer at the time with her talent and activities to progress women’s rights - a remarkable woman indeed 🌿 We were lucky enough to see some stunning original May Morris embroideries at our friends @williammorrissocietyuk - she was a true talent 🧵🪡
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Give us all the spring florals, we’re absolutely ready for the blooms to bloom this spring 🌷🌿 To celebrate, use code: SPRING on our website for 15% off everything (including our beautiful spring sale with exclusive colour ways and different products!) 🌱 Hope you’re all enjoying the sunshine today 🌞
Beautiful William Morris Daisy is on the table today 🌼
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Celebrating World Book day with a coffee meeting over one of our favourite books; our French archive ⚜️ Filled to the brim with beautiful designs, we might have picked a couple to be our new designs! Quilters, you’re going to want to watch this space! 🫶🏻 If anyone’s interested in how we bring a new design to life, let us know we’d be happy to film it for you! 🥰
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A little afternoon tea set up 🧸 Using stunning Willow Bough blue, we thought this is a perfect William Morris kids afternoon tea party 🤍
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Prepping some beautiful blooms 🌷 Got to include our fabulous William Morris tea towels of course 🩷
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What do you think to our new tote bags? ✨ Now in cotton fabrics, we’ve been perfecting the samples for weeks and they got stolen out the office and taken on a cruise by one of our team who thought they’d be the ideal holiday totes 🤍 what do you think? Shall we make these part of our range? ♥️
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Stunning Daisy is on the table 🫶🏻 Daisy was the first design William Morris produced so it’s always such a special one amongst his fans ✨
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#floraltablecloth #placemats #placematset #daisy #williammorrisdesign #williammorris #williammorrisfabric #fabric #floralfabric #florals #floraltable
Pack a fabric stack order with us ✨ which William Morris design is your fave? 🤎
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Oh Compton we love you! 🧡 All the details within Compton are so stunning, the winding leaves and florals, did you know it was the last design Morris himself before he passed? 🤎
featuring; William Morris Compton, our licensed digitally printed design ✨
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Back in stock alert! 🐇 One of our all time favourite designs is William Morris Brother Rabbit and we’ve just digitally printed it on cotton in the red everyone has always loved so much from our licensed collection 🥰
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📣 We’ve got a big announcement! 📣 We are now digitally printing our fabrics 🎉 Still printed in the United Kingdom (of course!) we always aim to bring you the highest quality, licensed William Morris designs (and exclusive florals but more on that later..) and by digitally printing them we can really focus on the details within the fabric, you can see how crisp all the aspects within the design are here: the little strawberries and the birds are so clear in the design 🍓 Printed onto high quality cotton, we’re so pleased to be able to print Morris designs displaying all the details just as he drew all those years ago 🎨 Timeless designs that when he was printing his designs in Merton Abbey Mill using the Indigo dye technique he’d never have been able to imagine the progress made that we can now digitally print them! 🤍 Strawberry Thief red is now back in stock, such a gorgeous design we adore it ♥️
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To celebrate Valentine’s Day this week, we’ve been looking through some Pre-Raphaelite love quotes including this one from Dante Gabriel Rossetti ♥️ They sure knew how to write poetry, we’ll share more of their beautiful words this week ✨
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Today’s tablescape feels very Valentines pretty 🤍 Beautiful Charlotte Rose is our design from our French archive, so timeless it’s on our table constantly through the year 🌹
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We’re closed for holiday soon! 🪩 From the 21st Jan- 6th Feb we’ll be taking a little break, so make sure your orders are placed before then, or we will send it when we’re back ✨ since we’re treating ourselves, we thought we’d treat you too with 15% off our website with code; MORRIS - valid until we close 🤍
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Merry Christmas everyone! 🎄 We hope you’ve all had a wonderful day ✨
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There’s still time to get your Christmas shopping ticked off! ✨ Free gift wrap on your orders and 10% off everything with code; festive 🎄 Just email us or message us to let us know you’d like us to gift wrap your order ☺️
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Loving cutting beautiful fabric stacks this Christmas! 🎄 A fabric stack is an ideal gift for quilters and crafters in your life, they’ll be able to enjoy using them for their next project ✨
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