Illustration: A. W. N. Pugin. Cross pattern design for a frontal of vestment, 1844.
In 1844, the English architect and designer Augustus Welby Northmore Pugin published a Glossary of Ecclesiastical Ornament and Costume, Compiled from Ancient Authorities and Examples. Although superficially a text based A to Z of accessories both in costume and furnishings for Catholic Church services, it was in fact much more fundamental in its remit. Rather than the A to Z aspect which started with Acolythe and ended in White, it was the seventy-three full colour illustrated plates at the back of the book that really caught both the eye and the imagination when first published in 1844.
Pugin, although often classed as an architect rather than as a decorative designer, understood pattern design instinctively. Many of his contemporaries saw him as an ideal and natural designer and recognised a real strength in his surface pattern work that was not always present in his architectural career. Although many see his later interior work for the Palace of Westminster as his crowning achievement, it can often appear, at least by our own contemporary standards, as somewhat overblown, intensely fussy and symbolically tiring, with an overemphasis of Tudor English themes that borders on the obsessive.
Illustration: A.W. N. Pugin. Various pattern designs for apparels of albes, 1844.
However, his decorative work outside of the political arena, although much of it was ecclesiastically based, gives a clear indication as to the natural skills of the decorative artist. The five illustrations for this article, which all come from the 1844 book, give a good indication of the strong colour palette and detailed but strident pattern work that was so much a part of Pugin's natural style and character as both a designer and as a creative individual. Much of the pattern work is well balanced and skilfully executed, although due to the large amounts of thick gold border work, some of pieces will seem more reminiscent to us of Christmas wrapping paper than anything else. However, this forms our own contemporary perspective and should therefore not interfere with an appreciation of the structure of the pattern work itself, no matter how tempting.
Interestingly, all of the work produced throughout the book follows the same fundamental ideal as the five pieces shown here. This regards surface pattern, its function and appearance, and the tenets of the Design Reform movement being put forward during the 1840s and 1850s by such contemporaries as Owen Jones, Richard Redgrave, Christopher Dresser and others.
Illustration: A. W. N. Pugin. Various pattern designs for apparels of albes, 1844.
Pugin, although not a member of the Design Reform movement itself, independently came to similar conclusions regarding the natural parameters that should be set for all forms of surface pattern construction. He was adamant that surface pattern by its very nature should reflect the material it was meant to decorate. Therefore, textiles and wallpapers being flat surfaces should be decorated by flat pattern work. This would naturally exclude all forms of three-dimensional trickery, including the use of shadows to create illusions.
Although at first the main tenet of Pugin's surface pattern ideas, along with that of the Design Reform movement, seems somewhat excessive and harshly critical of many other forms of surface pattern work, it does actually make common and practical sense when working with surface pattern. Many of the more memorable textile and wallpaper designs of the last century and a half have tended to follow this largely unwritten proviso, with outstanding work being produced by designers from William Morris to Lucienne Day.
Illustration: A.W. N. Pugin. Various pattern designs for apparels of albes, 1844.
Much contemporary surface pattern work still follows this ideal though in a relatively wide spectrum of variations from strict geometrical to implied dimension. However, as with life in general there has always been more than enough room in the decorative arts, particularly as far as pattern work is concerned, for more than one option of decorating a flat surface.
It is perhaps important to remember that before the likes of such creatively innovative decorative designers as Pugin, the inspirational parameters as well as that of the creative, was very limited. Most British designers tended on the whole to be inhouse employees, often with little if any professional design experience, and very often with little inspirational materials to hand. With at first no copyright laws and then for many years ones that remained difficult to enforce particularly internationally, pattern work was usually copied from contemporary rivals, or was endlessly redrawn from old pattern books with negligent amounts of significant innovation or creative license.
Illustration: A.W. N. Pugin. Various pattern designs for stoles and maniples, 1844.
This creatively barren loop of almost incestuous pattern work that constantly fed itself endlessly on its own product was in dire need of reform and reappraisal. Many criticised both the British textile and wallpaper industries as being more concerned with increased industrialisation, rather than that of creativity. In other words, critics wanted to see the industrial process with a creative dimension.
Although this was a long time in coming and it could be said that in many respects Britain never fully tackled the issue of creativity and mass production anywhere near as successfully as Germany did for example, the country did produce in the mid-nineteenth century many of the initial ideas and formulas for successful and creative surface pattern design that still guide our own contemporary industries today.
Further reading links:
God's Architect: Pugin and the Building of Romantic Britain
Pugin: A Gothic Passion
Pugin's Gothic Ornament: The Classic Sourcebook of Decorative Motifs with 100 Plates (Dover Pictorial Archives)
Contrasts: Or, a Parallel Between the Noble Edifices of the Fourteenth and Fifteenth Centuries and Similar Buildings of the Present Day Shewing the Present ... of Taste Accompanied by Appropriate Text.
A. W. N. Pugin: Master of Gothic Revival
The Stained Glass of A.W.N. Pugin
Pugin's Floral Ornament CD-ROM and Book (Dover Full-Color Electronic Design)
Pugin's Ecclesiastical Ornament (Dover Pictorial Archives)
Augustus Welby Pugin, Designer of the British Houses of Parliament: The Victorian Quest for a Liturgical Architecture
Nineteenth-Century Design: From Pugin to Mackintosh
True Principles of Pointed or Christian Architecture
Patterns: New Surface Design
Surface Pattern Design: A Handbook of How to Create Decorative and Repeat Patterns for Designers and Students
The Pattern Sourcebook: A Century of Surface Design
Surface Design for Fabric
Surface Design for Ceramics (A Lark Ceramics Book)
The Printed Pattern: Techniques and Projects for Inspired Printmaking and Surface Design
Design Your Own Repeat Patterns: A Quick and Easy Approach
