Illustration: Owen Jones. Textile design, 1851.
Although many critics wrote extensively on the merits of design reform during the early to mid-nineteenth century, particularly as regards surface pattern, we do not always get an opportunity to see personal examples of the ideas behind design reform. Usually we are given examples from various British and European companies giving an indication of good and bad standards of textile design as designated by the critic. This was usually the standard procedure because many of the critics involved in the Design Reform movement were not necessarily practical or technical designers, but came from a number of backgrounds, particularly that of fine art.
However, Owen Jones who was himself a vociferous promoter of what he deemed the correct principles of design and decoration did in fact produce design work himself, including furniture, interiors, architecture, carpet, wallpaper, ceramics, metalwork and textiles. It is in the disciplines of wallpaper and textiles that Jones was able to show the Victorian world his ideas regarding what he saw personally as being correct examples of surface pattern.
The example shown in this article is a design he produced in 1851 and was intended as a textile fabric for a chair cover and therefore was seen as a contemporary experiment in furniture fabrics. It was featured in an 1851 edition of the short lived Journal of Design and Manufactures, a specifically public platform for the Design Reform movement. The Journal has an interesting short article concerning this specific pattern in which it summarises nicely the ideals behind the movement in general and Jones piece in particular:
'Firstly, the design, is as it ought to be, of a perfectly flat unshadowed character. Secondly, the quantities and lines are equally distributed, so as to produce at a distance the appearance of levelness. Thirdly, the colours produce a neutral tint. And lastly, we may remark, that it is quite unobtrusive, which a covering of handsomer stuffs ought to be. The lines and forms are graceful, too, when examined closely.'
From this we can see that there were obvious main factors concerning both the Design Reform movement and Jones himself, at least as far as surface pattern was concerned.
There was that of a disregard, even denial for any physical use of illusion. The removal of any decorative tool that gave a form of shadow meant that surface pattern would become truly two, rather than three-dimensional, at least in its most obvious format. It was considered by the reform movement, and others, that surface pattern should really be seriously considering the medium in which it worked. Textile and wallpaper pattern in particular worked on either flat fabric or paper and therefore it was considered that a suitable decorative format for this flat medium should, in itself, also be flat. Many critics considered the contemporary penchant for three-dimensional floral, architectural, even landscape scenes, as particularly inadvisable.
Jones himself drew examples of flat pattern work from the Islamic world, giving a specific and detailed indication of the consistent successful use of graphic styled two-dimensional decoration from Southern Spain to Northern India. Although not all design reform critics were necessarily convinced that the way forward lay through the understanding and contemporary manipulation of Islamic design work, Jones argument for at least the modern observation of Islamic pattern work was very persuasive.
The balance and harmony of pattern work was stressed in Jones textile piece. Many contemporary examples in mid-nineteenth century Europe tended towards the blustery and the florid. There was often no real consideration of the parameters of pattern apart from that of instant shock and allurement. Big flowers, whether separately or in garlands, were often surrounded by architectural features, many of which were merely added to fill the composition, rather than as an integral part of the pattern. The clash of interior fabrics within early to mid-nineteenth century interiors offended the sensibilities of the design reform critics, though the public at large seemed happy enough with the loudness.
This 'loudness' led on to the third important criticism of contemporary design as seen through the example by Jones. Colour was often, according to the critics, overused and certainly overblown. Rich, saturated colour fields were used increasingly in both textile and wallpaper design within the period of the early to mid-nineteenth century. In many respects, although manufacturers wished to give the impression that their pattern work was reflecting the wonders of the natural world through floral prints, much of the work was one of heightened reality, with floral work being picked out in super-realism with a colour palette to match. Design critics thought a more muted and certainly a more natural palette was needed in order to tone down some of the more kaleidoscopic excesses of contemporary interiors.
Lastly, and probably most importantly for a successful piece of design work, a combination should be sought between all three crucial elements, dimension, balance and colour. Only thorough this finely harmonised combination would the future of surface pattern work be guaranteed, at least as far as the Design Reform movement was concerned.
Although not everyone was convinced, and certainly not necessarily manufacturers, although it would be incorrect to paint all textile and wallpaper manufacturers during this period as mono-focused capitalists, the Design Reform movement did make headway and by the end of the nineteenth century and more spectacularly in the twentieth, surface pattern as a flat decorative medium became much the norm. Some of Britain's most spectacularly creative textile work was produced in the twentieth century, at least up to and including the 1960s, and although many of these designers would have been indebted to a number of external influences and ideals, it cannot be dismissed that a relatively intense design reform debate held during the early to mid-nineteenth century, had some equally persuasive influence on the development of surface pattern.
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