Matthew Digby Wyatt

(1820 -1877)

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Sir Matthew Digby Wyatt (28 July 1820 – 21 May 1877) was a British architect and art historian who became Secretary of the Great Exhibition, Surveyor of the East India Company and the first Slade Professor of Fine Art at the University of Cambridge.

From 1855 until 1859 he was honorary secretary of the Royal Institute of British Architects, and in 1866 received the Royal Gold Medal.

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Owen Jones

(1809 - 1874)

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Owen Jones (15 February 1809 – 19 April 1874) was a British architect. A versatile architect and designer, he was also one of the most influential design theorists of the nineteenth century. He helped pioneer modern colour theory, and his theories on flat patterning and ornament still resonate with contemporary designers today.

Jones was able to disseminate his theories on pattern and ornament through his work for several of the key manufacturers of the period, thus facilitating public consumption of his decorative visions in a number of diverse contexts. During the 1840s, having been inspired by the tilework at the Alhambra, Jones became known for his designs for mosaics and tessellated pavements, working for firms such as Maw & Co., Blashfield and Minton.

He designed wallpapers for several firms from the 1840s until the 1870s including Townsend and Parker, Trumble & Sons and Jeffrey & Co. Jones was also prolific in the field of textiles – designing silks for Warner, Sillett & Ramm and carpets for Brinton and James Templeton & Co. Jones also immersed himself in a number of decorative schemes for domestic interiors, most notably working in collaboration with the London firm Jackson & Graham to produce furniture and other fittings.

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Auguste Racinet

Oct 18, 2025

Albert Racinet

(1825 - 1893)

Auguste Racinet

(1825 - 1893)

Albert-Charles-Auguste Racinet himself an accomplished artist, is best known today for publishing two major pictorial works on the history of design — Le costume historique and L'Ornement polychrome — while engraver and artistic director at the Parisian publisher Firmin Didot et Cie. Published in ten instalments between 1869 and 1873, the first iteration of L'Ornement polychrome (Colour ornament) is a visual record in 100 plates of the decorative arts from antiquity to the eighteenth century.

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The work was such a huge success that in 1885–7 Racinet brought out a second series, this time of 120 plates, and updated to include designs of the nineteenth century as well. The imagery presented in both series is drawn from a wide array of various mediums, including woodwork, metalwork, architecture, textiles, painting, and pottery, and from cultures all over the world.

Medieval pattern from L'ornement Polychrome (1888) by Owen Jones (1825–1893). Digitally enhanced from our own original 1888 edition.

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Erté

Oct 17, 2025

Erté

(1892 - 1990)

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Romain de Tirtoff, known by the pseudonym Erté, was a Russian-born French artist and designer. He worked in several fields, including fashion, jewellery, graphic arts, costume, set design for film, theatre, and opera, and interior decor.

His work is quintessentially emblematic of the Art Deco style in its use of tapering lines and simplified ornamentation inspired by the natural world, and his figurines are internationally known and desired as collectible objects.

Erté moved to Paris in 1910, disobeying his father’s wishes for him to become a naval officer. In 1915, he secured a contract with Harper’s Bazaar magazine, producing numerous illustrations and other media. Today, Erté’s work can be found in the collections of the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, and the Victoria and Albert Museum in London. He died on April 21, 1990 in Paris, France.

William Morris

Oct 17, 2025

William Morris

(1834 - 1896)

William Morris

(1845 - 1896)

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William Morris was an English textile designer, poet, artist, writer, and socialist activist associated with the British Arts and Crafts movement. He was a major contributor to the revival of traditional British textile arts and methods of production.

In his lifetime, Morris produced items in a range of crafts, mainly those to do with furnishing, including over 600 designs for wallpaper, textiles, and embroideries, over 150 for stained glass windows, three typefaces, and around 650 borders and ornamentations for the Kelmscott Press.

Watercolour, woven fabric design: Dove and Rose (1879) by William Morris. Original from The Birmingham Museum. Digitally enhanced by rawpixel.

Read more about William Morris in our post: William Morris: The First Celebrity Designer?

Morris emphasised the idea that the design and production of an item should not be divorced from one another, and that, where possible, those creating items should be designer-craftsmen, thereby both designing and manufacturing their goods.

In the field of textile design, Morris revived a number of dead techniques, and insisted on the use of good quality raw materials, almost all natural dyes, and hand processing.