I’ve long been a fan of William Morris design and looked for someplace we could see his work in England. We stayed near Kelmscott Manor in the Cotswolds, where he lived for a while, but it was difficult to get to using public transportation. So when I saw this gallery in suburban London, in a house he grew up in, I decided to visit here instead.
It’s not a large gallery, yet it has lots of examples of his work, from furniture (including a couple of classic Morris chairs) to ceramics and tapestries. And of course wallpaper.
You get to see how things were made, too. We saw examples of wood blocks used in printing.
The stairway had an example of Morris style carpeting.
Outside there were some pretty extensive gardens. Not a lot was blooming while we were there.
The gallery is at the end of the Victoria line in Walthamstow, so you get a look at the London burbs too. It has a market — Europe’s longest outdoor street market — and while I normally like a good market, there was lots of road construction so we skipped it.
I have never been in any rich man's house which would not have looked the better for having a bonfire made ... of nine-tenths of all that it held.