#victoriaandalbert — Public Fediverse posts

“Have nothing … that you do not know to be useful or believe to be beautiful.” —Wm Morris

A huge influence on the Arts and Crafts movement, William Morris revived block printing and vegetable dyeing. He set up looms for weaving tapestry and hand-knotting carpets in his home. His designs were also translated into stained glass. He was a knowledgeable textile historian, and fascinated by medieval history and medieval architecture.

Morris was the most successful textile designer and manufacturer of his day, with two London shops selling silk, cotton, and gauze. He designed and decorated parts of what’s now the Victoria & Albert. This museum has 1,100 objects connected to Morris—mainly textile and wallpaper, in various colours and scales, for interior decorating. Copyright on his repeating patterns of vegetation, flowers, and birds, recently expired, which fuelled a revival of these textile designs.

#applied #art #design #WilliamMorris #ArtsAndCrafts #VictoriaAndAlbert #museum #textile

How did 1600s Dutch households keep their fire embers from going out at night? With a curfew.

Yes, it's a pun. Curfews were metal covers that kept fire embers smouldering overnight, to be revived for the next day's cooking and heating. The word curfew comes from the French for fire cover (couvre feu).

The brass one pictured here is among the earliest to survive, made in Holland but now in London's V&A. It's embossed with an image of Saint Lawrence.

This is dark humour, since Lawrence was roasted alive in the third century—punishment for perhaps the first Christian protest. The early church's refusal to worship Roman gods led to persecution. Lawrence was ordered to surrender the church's treasures to authorities. He turned up with the sick, marginalized, poor, elderly, and widows, boldly proclaiming: “These are the true treasures of the church.” For this insolence, he was martyred (killed).

#art #design #brass #heating #fire #religion #saint #martyr #VictoriaAndAlbert #museum #UK

How did 1600s Dutch households keep their fire embers from going out at night? With a curfew.

Yes, it's a pun. Curfews were metal covers that kept fire embers smouldering overnight, to be revived for the next day's cooking and heating. The word curfew comes from the French for fire cover (couvre feu).

The brass one pictured here is among the earliest to survive, made in Holland but now in London's V&A. It's embossed with an image of Saint Lawrence.

This is dark humour, since Lawrence was roasted alive in the third century—punishment for perhaps the first Christian protest. The early church's refusal to worship Roman gods led to persecution. St Lawrence was ordered to surrender the church's treasures to authorities. He turned up with the sick, marginalized, poor, elderly, and widows, boldly proclaiming: “These are the true treasures of the church.” For this insolence, he was roasted to death.

#art #design #brass #heating #fire #religion #saint #martyr #VictoriaAndAlbert #museum #UK

What could a bow shoot, besides arrows? Stones or pellets.

Pellet bows propel a pebble or clay pellet from a silk pouch on a double string.

The artistry is both in making the bow and string and in the shooting technique, or khatra. On releasing the string and pellet, archers must immediately move the bow—and the hand holding it—out of the path of the projectile, to avoid painful injury.

Pellet bows were used to hunt small game, on the ground or in flight.

Pictured is a bamboo galalee, goolal, or gulal, from mid-1800s Lahore, India. This bow has double strings of thin bamboo strips and blackened thread, joined in the centre by a sling attachment, for hurling clay pellets or stones. It's painted in green and gold, with ivory mountings.

This weapon was displayed in the India Museum from 1879, then transferred down the road in 1955 to the South Kensington, later the Victoria & Albert, then to the V&A's East Storehouse.

#design #art #weapon #bow #archery #VictoriaAndAlbert #museum #UK

Can a cookie tin be a work of decorative art? Yes.

When the UK's Licensed Grocer's Act of 1861 first allowed the sale of individually packaged groceries, decorative cookie tins ("biscuit tins" in the UK) got their start. These simple metal boxes were soon embossed with 3D detail, and decorated with colourful lithographic prints.

They sold as Christmas gifts for children. (UK grocer Marks & Spencer continues the tradition.) Later tins appealed to adults, and decorated middle-class homes across Britain's empire.

By 1890, the mass-produced tins mimicked other objects in shape—first baskets, then collectable art like Chinese vases.

The 1912 "Bell" biscuit tin below has a faux copper finish. It's in the Victoria and Albert Museum's collection, and was made for Reading, UK, biscuit makers Huntley & Palmers. See the image description (ALT text) for details.

Today's biscuit tins are sometimes sold in UK fundraisers.

#art #design #VictoriaAndAlbert #museum #cookie #biscuit #tin #container

Can a cookie tin be a work of decorative art? Yes.

When the UK's Licensed Grocer's Act of 1861 first allowed the sale of individually packaged groceries, decorative cookie tins ("biscuit tins" in the UK) got their start. These simple metal boxes were soon embossed with 3D detail, and decorated with colourful lithographic prints.

They sold as Christmas gifts for children. (UK grocer Marks & Spencer continues the tradition.) Later tins appealed to adults, and decorated middle-class homes across Britain's empire.

By 1890, the mass-produced tins mimicked other objects in shape—first baskets, then collectable art like Chinese vases.

The 1912 "Bell" biscuit tin below has a faux copper finish. It's in the Victoria and Albert Museum's collection, and was made for Reading, UK, biscuit makers Huntley & Palmers. See the image description (ALT text) for details.

Today's biscuit tins are sometimes sold in UK fundraisers.

#art #design #VictoriaAndAlbert #museum #cookie #biscuit #tin #container

Can a cookie tin be a work of decorative art? Yes.

When the UK's Licensed Grocer's Act of 1861 first allowed the sale of individually packaged groceries, decorative cookie tins ("biscuit tins" in the UK) got their start. These simple metal boxes were soon embossed with 3D detail, and decorated with colourful lithographic prints.

They sold as Christmas gifts for children. (UK grocer Marks & Spencer continues the tradition.) Later tins appealed to adults, and decorated middle-class homes across Britain's empire.

By 1890, the mass-produced tins mimicked other objects in shape—first baskets, then collectable art like Chinese vases.

The 1912 "Bell" biscuit tin below has a faux copper finish. It's in the Victoria and Albert Museum's collection, and was made for Reading, UK, biscuit makers Huntley & Palmers. See the image description (ALT text) for details.

Today's biscuit tins are sometimes sold in UK fundraisers.

#art #design #VictoriaAndAlbert #museum #cookie #biscuit #tin #container

Can a cookie tin be a work of decorative art? Yes.

When the UK's Licensed Grocer's Act of 1861 first allowed the sale of individually packaged groceries, decorative cookie tins ("biscuit tins" in the UK) got their start. These simple metal boxes were soon embossed with 3D detail, and decorated with colourful lithographic prints.

They sold as Christmas gifts for children. (UK grocer Marks & Spencer continues the tradition.) Later tins appealed to adults, and decorated middle-class homes across Britain's empire.

By 1890, the mass-produced tins mimicked other objects in shape—first baskets, then collectable art like Chinese vases.

The 1912 "Bell" biscuit tin below has a faux copper finish. It's in the Victoria and Albert Museum's collection, and was made for Reading, UK, biscuit makers Huntley & Palmers. See the image description (ALT text) for details.

Today's biscuit tins are sometimes sold in UK fundraisers.

#art #design #VictoriaAndAlbert #museum #cookie #biscuit #tin #container

Can a cookie tin be a work of decorative art? Yes.

When the UK's Licensed Grocer's Act of 1861 first allowed the sale of individually packaged groceries, decorative cookie tins ("biscuit tins" in the UK) got their start. These simple metal boxes were soon embossed with 3D detail, and decorated with colourful lithographic prints.

They sold as Christmas gifts for children. (UK grocer Marks & Spencer continues the tradition.) Later tins appealed to adults, and decorated middle-class homes across Britain's empire.

By 1890, the mass-produced tins mimicked other objects in shape—first baskets, then collectable art like Chinese vases.

The 1912 "Bell" biscuit tin below has a faux copper finish. It's in the Victoria and Albert Museum's collection, and was made for Reading, UK, biscuit makers Huntley & Palmers. See the image description (ALT text) for details.

Today's biscuit tins are sometimes sold in UK fundraisers.

#art #design #VictoriaAndAlbert #museum #cookie #biscuit #tin #container

What colour is fashionable skin? It's Nude.

Until very recently, the fashion industry's stance was that only a peach-pink (White) skin tone could be called nude. For example, in 2010, the British editor of Elle said nude is "a defined colour. It’s white nude, not black nude". Nude is also the name of Pantone colour 12-0911.

But in 2013, major fashion house Christian Louboutin was first to launch a shoe range in 5 skin tones, from dark to light. Skin-toned shoes, particularly if high-heeled, make the wearer's leg look longer since the leg and foot blend into the shoe. Louboutin's popular Nudes Collection later expanded to 7 tones with various heels. The shoe range continues to pose questions about racialism and to challenge the fashion industry to redefine "nude" so it includes people of all ethnicities.

See each of Louboutin's napa nude Fifi shoes up close: https://collections.vam.ac.uk/search/?kw_object_type=Shoe&page=1&page_size=15&q_actor=Louboutin

#design #art #fashion #racialism #ethnicity #skintone #nude #shoe #footwear #VictoriaAndAlbert #museum