How to bring Arts and Crafts style to your home
21 February 2023 Arts and Crafts style, a celebration of honest craftsmanship and naturalistic design, developed between 1860-1920.But the fashion has remained popular and interior designers are returning to its ethos for inspiration.
From rustic furniture to hand-crafted objects, Arts and Crafts style can work in any home.
Here is a selection of items coming up at Tennants’ 20th century design sale on March 4.
Arts and crafts sideboard
This Arts and Crafts oak sideboard was originally sold by London department Liberty & Co. It is featured in the book Daryl Bennett’s 2012 book Liberty's Furniture 1875-1915.
Decorative church scrolls
This pair of decorative carved oak church rood beams are attributed to Scottish architect and furniture designer Sir Robert Lorimer (1864-1929). The auction house notes that architectural drawings of a very similar design were sold at auction house Lyon & Turnbull on April 1 2020.
Silver box
This Arts & Crafts silver and enamel cigarette box is marked for London 1906 and was designed by Omar Ramsden (1873-1939) and Alwyn Carr (1872-1940). Ramsden was one of England’s leading silversmiths and had a long term collaboration with designer Carr. This box has a design of sailing ships on a green and red enamel ground and is inscribed.
Arts and Crafts frame
This Arts and Crafts copper rectangular mirror has riveted and circular embossed decoration.
Stained glass window
If you really want to make a statement, what about a church stained glass window in the style of Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood artist Sir Edward Burne-Jones?
The vast majority of his stained-glass windows remain in their original buildings so this window of St Margaret of Antioch is rare.
The design was created by Burne-Jones and made and sold by Morris & Co (the company founded by Arts and Crafts master William Morris).
St Margaret was a subject Burne-Jones returned to repeatedly, creating numerous variations. The first was made for St Peter’s Church in Bramley, West Yorkshire, which is recorded in the Morris & Co Catalogue of Designs for Stained Glass, and 16 others are known today.
However, Tennants states the closest match to the present panel is in a watercolour design in the Huntington Library collection in California for three windows of female saints for All Saints Church in Winnipeg, Canada. An inscription on the drawing by its previous owner, architect Sanford Berger, notes that only the central panel of St Hilda was completed and installed, and indeed the window still resides in the church’s Lady Chapel.
For more on buying antique furniture visit thesaleroom.com's guide.
For tips on how to buy at auction visit thesaleroom.com's auction guide.