It has been rather difficult getting the colour right in the photos, due to the reflection of the glass. The centre background is pale blue and the fruits are lovely warm shades. There is lots of light and movement in this piece.
Probably designed by William Morris for Morris & Company in the 1880s. The embroidery is particularly large so would have been made as a firescreen. The silks for this embroidery, which are typically thick floss silks produced for Morris & Company, have been chosen with a artistic eye. They are subtle and very beautiful. The embroidery is particularly nice because the embroiderer did not run out of the background silk and have to substitute a different colour. Most of M & Co embroideries I see have a small area of the background worked in a different shade.
Embroidery kits became the mainstay for Morris & Co and sold in their Oxford Street shop. The designs were available in three different stages of completion; as background fabric with the design marked, to be embroidered at home; with the design marked with the embroidery already started as a guide; or the whole piece could be worked by Morris & Co.
The central circle with an apple tree, with seven large apples in terracotta, apricot and cream, the leaves of four shades of green, bronze, and ivory, the two species of tulips, and five petalled flowers in ivory and pale pink, growing at the trees base, the ground in a soft blue/green, the spandrels with terracotta tulips with blue green stems and ivory leaves, larger acanthus leaves, all on a soft bronze/green ground, worked in thick floss silks in running stitch.
The embroidery 21 in; 53 cm sq.
Recently mounted and framed with a neutral ivory card mount and natural wood frame, but not by me.
Excellent.
William Morris Textiles Linda Parry.
All images and text © meg-andrews.com 2021
