Dropped into one of London's most distinguished shops yesterday. Liberty is a refined independently-minded department store on Regent Street, born out of the Arts & Crafts movement. Tana lawn, a finely woven but crisp cotton dress fabric, is Liberty's most iconic product loved by many generations. Here are some familiar designs from the Liberty archive. Remember that they are scaled for a little dress or a man's tie.
Betsy created in 1933
Wiltshire 1933
Phoebe 1966
Thorpe 1968Ideal for children's clothes and big girls' blouses ha, I mean for men and women, crafts people, quilt makers.. it's quite simply divine.
Imagine my surprise and delight to find that they have commissioned designs by Grayson Perry in a new promotion called Prints Charming. He is joined by other renowned artists and designers and you can see the products on the Liberty website (Click here).
I like the way Perry subverts the traditional innocence of Liberty print
I had to buy the minimum 30cm of each fabric to show you. The colour isn't quite right here; think more greeny yellow and a warmer blue. The 'conversation' of this print is an apocalyptic landscape of a polluted world inhabited by our children. A grim fairytale indeed.
Both designs come in at least four colourways and retail at around £19 a metre.
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Perfect post timing I'd say. These are fascinating. Funny-I am reading the new A S Byatt book where Liberty and Grimm inhabit. A good one. GT
ReplyDeleteThank you Gaye. Wish you could have seen the full range of prints and the Liberty shop itself which reminds one of an Elizabethan/Jacobean
ReplyDeletehall. The shopping galleries arranged around a square space.
I got the advert for these. I wasn't wild about the colourways in any of the fabrics, although I do like a lot of the other ones.
ReplyDeleteSome of the colours are purposely off-key and some a bit technicolour. I loved the two I chose but wasn't that keen on the others.
ReplyDelete