Accessorize your home the Arts and Crafts way
Giving your home the odd touch of Arts and Crafts practicality can create a peaceful haven – but beauty doesn’t lose out in the process. Nell Darby has some great tips on how to add some Arts and Crafts flair to your existing decor.
The Arts and Crafts movement was at its most popular between the 1880s and about 1910. Its main proponent was artist and designer William Morris, who believed that people should “have nothing in your home that you do not know to be useful or believe to be beautiful”. As that quote implies, the movement tried to make people’s homes more attractive, combining usefulness with beauty.
Morris designed a whole range of interior furnishings – from wallpapers to curtains, carpets to sideboards and chests. Today, his designs are instantly recognisable; take, for example, the willow pattern. His creations typically feature repeating motifs of natural flora. Some of his popular pieces incorporate willow, lotus, oak, fruits – such as strawberries – sunflowers, and honeysuckle.
The use of flowers or natural imagery is a popular feature of designs from the era straddling the end of the 19th century and the start of the 20th. Scottish architect Charles Rennie Mackintosh created long, sinuous tulips, draped around angular latticed frames. Rennie Mackintosh-inspired dining chairs often have a long back with geometric patterns carved into them, or stylised plants or flowers – or both!
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Category: Get a vintage home, Interiors, Vintage news
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