Designer Desire: Gillian Farr

When we featured Juliet Glynn-Smith in last week’s Designer Desire post, we discovered the work of Gillian Farr who was one of her contemporaries at Terence Conran Fabrics Ltd.

Two of Farr’s best known patterns for Conran are Master Tuggie’s and Gilliflower; both from 1964, the latter winning a Cotton Board Awards prize that year.

Prior to working at Terence Conran Fabrics, Farr was part of Liberty of London’s studio in the 1950s where she designed their now re-issued Mitsi print (the 5 colourways can be seen at the bottom of the montage). She later created Mirabelle – also re-issued – for the company in 1962 (the 3 colourways are at the top of the montage).

According to Anna Buruma, Liberty Archivist and author of Liberty and Co. in the Fifties and Sixties: A Taste for Design, she designed the pattern, circa 1964, of the pictured Jean Muir Liberty-print silk dress that once belonged to Joanna Lumley.

Gillian Farr’s work is included in a new exhibition (which runs until Sunday 2 June 2019) at the Fashion and Textile Museum in London. Her work also features in the accompanying book by Geoffrey Rayner and Richard Chamberlain (to be published 25th Feb 2019).

Additional image credits:
Kerry Taylor Auctions

Designer Desire: Juliet Glynn-Smith

We first featured Juliet Glynn-Smith (b. 1939) on our blog when we acquired a sheet of kitchen cards that she designed for Habitat. As well as being responsible for the illustrations in the shop’s very first catalogue she produced a number of textile designs for Conran Fabrics. These include ‘Prince of Quince’ (1965); the children’s designs, ‘Jackanapes’ and ‘Toy Cupboard’; ‘Lollipop’ (1966); ‘Petals in the Sky’ and ‘Daisy Spray’ from their Firecracker Collection (1969).

Although she’s best known for her Habitat work, she has also created designs for other firms. One such company is Hunkydory Designs Ltd. Three of the brand’s wrapping papers are included in the montage above; ‘Big Heart’, ‘Big Flower’ and ‘Big Stripe’, all from 1970. Also above are her ‘Fauna’ greetings cards and ‘Santa’ Christmas cards which she designed for the company the same year.

She worked for Parkertex – for whom she created the ‘Fanfare’ fabric design in 1968 – and for German company, Rasch doing designs for their ‘Contempora’ and ‘Künstler’ textile collections in 1973.

For Christmas 1967, Glynn-Smith designed a psychedelic screen print poster which advertised Thursday late night shopping at D.H Evans, an Oxford Street department store (now a branch of House of Fraser).

‘Zig zig’ and ‘Polygon’ (pictured side-by-side above) were two wrapping paper designs made under the name of Glynn Smith Associates in 1972.

As well a textiles and paper, Juliet Glynn-Smith also produced designs that were used on metalware. The square Britannia serving tray, included above, was for Reginald Corfield Ltd. in 1966. We’ve come across a pair of ‘Sprig’ storage tins for previously mentioned, Hunkydory Designs Ltd.

Image credits:

Pinterest | Shelf Appeal | V&A | Visual Arts Data Service

Designer Desire: Pat Albeck

Pat Albeck, (1930-2017), was a Hull-born, award-winning designer dubbed the ‘Queen of the tea towel’. She attended the Royal College of Art in 1950 to study Printed Textiles.

In her long and illustrious career, she worked for English stalwarts, the National Trust, Horrockses, Worcester Ware, Jonelle and John Lewis for whom she designed ‘Pansy’ and the incredibly successful, William Morris-inspired, ‘Daisychain’ (seen in two colourways, second row of images above).

Her designs grace fashion and furnishing fabrics, tea towels, tablecloths, wrapping paper, wallpaper, paper bags, metal trays and ceramics. Later on in her career, she produced beautiful paper collages (as seen in the bottom right image above).

Many of her vintage homeware items are readily available on eBay. There are also a number of books exploring her designs that are available on Abe Books and Amazon.

She collaborated with her daughter-in-law, Emma Bridgewater, on numerous designs. She once said:

You won’t find my designs in people’s living rooms; they are far more suited to the working areas of the home – the kitchen, the nursery and children’s bedrooms.

Check out this tour of her wonderful home in Oxfordshire.

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Additional image credits:

Designer Desire: Althea McNish

_{(from top, left to right: Painted Dessert in 2 colourways, Tomee, Van Gogh in 2 colourways, Rubra in 2 colourways, Golden Harvesamazot in 2 colourways, Tropique, Pomegranate, Gilia, Bousada, Tepeaca, Unknown, Hibiscus, Trinidad, Magi, Caribe, Oriana)}

Shame on me! I have only recently been introduced to the work of Althea McNish by Liz Evans of Retro Pattern. I really should know of McNish, she originally came from Trinidad.

Althea McNish (1933-2020) began designing fashion and furnishing textiles in the 1950s. She designed 8 patterns for Hull Traders, a manufacturer who were based not far from us, just over the border in Colne, Lancashire – Golden Harvest, Painted Desert, Van Gogh (all 1959), Oriana, Pomegranate (both 1960), Gilia, Rubra (both 1961) and Magi (1964). At this firm, she worked alongside the likes of Shirley Craven, John Drummond, Ivon Hitchens and Eduardo Paolozzi.

She was also commissioned to produce designs for the likes of:

Liberty & Co – Bousada, Cebollas, Hibiscus (all 1958), Grenada, Tepeaca (1960)
Heal’s – Caribe
Ascher Ltd – Tropique (1957)
Cavendish Textiles – Lumière (1961)
Dior
Balenciaga

In 1959, she designed two murals entitled Pineapples and Pomegranates and Rayflower for the tourist class restaurant aboard the P&O Orient cruise liner, Oriana. She also produced a mural in the 1980s for Royal Caribbean Cruise Line’s Nordic Empress and MS Monarch.

A number of museums hold her designs in their permanent collections including the V&A, National Museums Scotland, Cooper Hewitt and Philadelphia Museum of Art.

There’s a lovely documentary entitled, Whoever Heard of a Black Artist? Britain’s Hidden Art History currently on the BBC iPlayer (there’s just over a week left to view it!) in which she’s been interviewed. I can’t recommend it highly enough! McNish is one of 21 designers profiled in Libby Sellers’ new book, Women Design.

Examples of her designs come up for sale from time to time. Your first port of call should be Retro Pattern; contact them via their Instragram account. In addition, have a search on Etsy.

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I have always seen myself as a citizen of the world, drawing inspiration from the flora and fauna of every country and the art and artefacts of all cultures.

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Additional image credits:

H is for Home Harbinger

Tag: textile design

Designer Desire: Gillian Farr

Designer Desire: Juliet Glynn-Smith

Designer Desire: Pat Albeck

Designer Desire: Althea McNish