February 1, 2016

Object: Textile

Designer: Morris & Co.

Medium: Printed Cotton

Date: 1876

Country: England

Credit: Purchase of the Drexel Institute

This textile of printed linen is one of the first objects acquired by the Museum of the Drexel Institute.  These early acquisitions reflect the anti-industrial bias of the 19th
century and included historic textiles, handmade lace, and examples of non-western and traditional dress. The exception to this bias was the purchase of several contemporary Arts & Crafts textiles from Morris & Co. and Thomas Wardle & Co. in the 1890s. Wardle and Morris were famed for their artistic textiles handcrafted and colored using natural dyes. It is surely this reputation as innovators and ‘true artists” of the British Arts & Crafts Movement that allowed for the inclusion of modern textiles in the early days of the Museum of Drexel Institute.