Junichi Arai (1932 – 2017) was a Japanese textile designer and producer born in Kiryu, Gunma. As the sixth generation of a mill-owning family, Arai grew up with fabrics being woven for obis and kimonos. He held traditional weaving methods in high regard and the skills that only the human hand can have in the art of fabric making. Read More →
Jacqueline Groag (1903 – 1986) was a Czech textile designer and ceramicist. Born in Prague she studied in Vienna at the Kunstgewerbeschule during the 1920s. In 1937 she moved to Paris where she designed dress prints for Jeanne Lanvin, Elsa Schiparelli and others.Read More →
Helen Abson, who trained as an architect, is an Australian designer. She pursued architecture for five years; founded ZAB Design where she designed fabrics that exhibited a preoccupation for texture achieved through pattern and colour.Read More →
She began teaching weaving at the Bauhaus in 1931. She worked at the Dresdener Deutsche Werkstatten in 1931, designing woven textiles, and was the head of the weaving department at the Berlin Modeschule from 1932 to 1936. She worked as the head designer for Gateshead, a British fabric manufacturer.Read More →
Laura Ashley was one of the first British designers to experiment with the concept of lifestyle marketing. Her romantic vision of nineteenth-century rural life, adapted to modern domestic realities, inspired a generation of middle-class Britons who returned to country life in the 1960s and 1970s.Read More →
Masakazu Kobayashi studied at the University of Arts, Kyoto, Japan. He manifested traditional textile techniques and aesthetics in his work. Between 1966 and 1975, he worked as a textile designer for Kawashima. His 1982 fabric evoked komon, a textile dyeing technique which uses paper patterns with small motifs.Read More →
Hiroshi Awatsuji (1929- 1995) was a Japanese textile and graphic designer: born in Kyoto. He was considered the first Japanese textile designer to be recognised for contemporary design rather than for traditional art and craft. The main characteristic of his work was over sized motifs.Read More →
Tammis Keefe (1913–1960) was an American textile designer. She designed everything from dish towels to glassware in her airy Dorothy Leibis Studio. Her work can be found at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, Cooper Hewitt and the Fashion Institute of Technology.Read More →
Lucienne Day was one of the most influential post-war British textile designers. She developed a unique style of pattern making. READ MORERead More →
In the early decades of the 20th century, Paul Poiret was a crucial figure in the French fashion industry, notably by adding a deep oriental flavour and rich colours to contemporary clothing. Read More →
It was founded in 1914, by Alexander Morton who reorganised his Alexander Morton and Company Ltd, with Morton Sundour as “the major off-shoot”. It was run by his second son James Morton.Read More →
Because its members had previous careers in the textile industry, they wanted to be free to promote their creative ideas. Read More →
Marianne Straub began weaving as a child and later trained under Heinrich Otto Hürlimann Between 1928-31, at the Kunstgewerbeschule, Zürich. Between 1932-33, she was involved with machine production, at Bradford Technical College.Read More →
Gertrud Preiswerk was a Swiss textile designer she was born in Basel. Between 1926 andRead More →
Morton joined his family’s Morton Sundour Fabrics in 1931 and oversaw the company’s first screen-printed fabrics. He was the artistic director and principal designer of Edinburgh Weavers in Carlisle, which was established in 1928 as Morton Sundour’s creative design unit from 1932 to 1935. From the 1930s, he was a supporter of the Modern movement, commissioning works from well-known painters and artists.Read More →
Katsuji Wakisaka is a Japanese textile designer. Between 1960 -1963 he studied textile design in Kyoto.Read More →
In the early 1960s, he taught at the Falmouth School of Art in Cornwall. Some of his textiles incorporated contrasting colors in small dots suggesting printed circuitry, as in his 1963 Cruachan fabric produced by Hull Traders.Read More →
He commissioned some of the most innovative screen prints of the 1930s, designed by Vanessa Bell and Duncan Grant, as a principle of Allan Walton Fabrics. Read More →
THE MOTHER OF INTERIOR DESIGN
She is noted for helping to open the field of interior design to women, supporting craftswomen, and for encouraging a new style of American design.Read More →
Alexander Girard (1907 – 1993) was a man of many design talents. He trained asRead More →