William Morris
William Morris posters: repeating leaves, vines and dense pattern worked in deep reds and greens. Browse the set and compare designs.
Showing all 5 resultsSorted by latest
William Morris posters: patterns that never went out of date
William Morris (1834–1896) was a designer, poet, printer and one of the founders of the Arts & Crafts movement. He believed that useful things should be beautiful and that decoration should come from observation — leaves, birds, flowers — rather than from imitation of earlier styles. The wallpapers and textiles he designed for Morris & Co. are still in production today, which is a rare thing for a nineteenth-century pattern.
What is in this collection
- Repeat patterns — Pimpernel, Blackthorn, Snakeshead and Cray. Each one is built on the same principle: a motif that repeats across the whole surface with no obvious centre, so the eye keeps moving.
- The exhibition print — the centenary exhibition poster, made for a museum show of his work, with the lettering and layout of a printed poster rather than a wallpaper sample.
How to choose one
The darker grounds — Blackthorn and Snakeshead — work in a hallway, a study or a room with dark wood; they read as texture from a distance and as drawing up close. Pimpernel is the lighter, more open pattern and suits a bedroom or a pale living room. Cray sits between the two.
Morris posters take a wooden or brass frame badly disguised: a thin black or natural oak frame keeps the pattern doing the work. They also pair naturally with a Scandinavian interior, which shares the same taste for natural materials, or with a museum poster next to them for contrast between pattern and typography.
Sizes, paper and delivery
Every poster is printed on Hahnemühle paper and is available in sizes from 30×40 to 70×100 cm, plus A3 and A2. Smaller formats keep the repeat legible at close range; 70×100 cm lets a single motif fill a wall. Orders leave the studio within 24 business hours, delivery in the EU takes 3–5 working days (3–6 outside the EU), and every parcel is tracked.
Why a pattern poster works where a picture does not
A picture asks to be looked at; a pattern asks to be lived with. That is why Morris's designs survive in interiors that have nothing else Victorian in them — they are decoration in the honest sense, made to sit behind a chair or above a table without demanding attention.
Browse the whole shop or see all artists.