Chapter XI: Design and Colour

CARPET designing is a branch of Applied Art which makes exacting demands upon its adherents, requiring as it does technical knowledge to an exceptional extent. The average designer who ventures into this field, however high his artistic ability may be, is not likely to achieve a practical success, unless and until he has studied the particular capacities and limitations of carpet fabrics. For this reason, the public carpet designer is more or less of a specialist in his domain, which is rarely invaded unless by such exceptional craftsmen as the late Walter Crane or Voysey. Similarly, and because there are so many varieties of carpet fabrics, requiring special knowledge and treatment, all carpet manufacturers maintain private staffs of designers, whose business it is to produce new patterns for each season and quality in accordance with the commercial requirements. For the manufacturer has to be governed to a great extent by the tastes and inclinations of his customers, the carpet dealers, and cannot afford to be too enterprising in initiating novelties, while the carpet dealer, in his turn is, as a rule, rather a follower than a leader of the public taste. The commercial standard has, therefore, been to some extent a hampering influence upon the progress of carpet design towards perfection, but it is certainly less so than in the past. For it has been modified of recent years by a new tendency, which, however, is not one of unmixed advantage to the manufacturer.

This tendency may be expressed as the intervention of the consumer. Scarcity of materials during the war, and the consequent obligation of carpet dealers to accept what they can get from manufacturers has, temporarily at any rate, modified the influence of the individual buyer of carpets upon carpet design and colour; but previous to the war it had become a factor to be reckoned with. There were, and are, many householders possessed of definite ideas upon arrangement of design, combination of colour, and harmony of decoration; and these ideas often germinate in suggestions or demands conveyed through the dealer to the manufacturer for single carpets of special colouring or arrangement. Often these suggestions prove to be more original than effective; but often they lead to effects both artistic and saleable.

This critical and creative spirit on the part of the individual is not, therefore, to be despised by the technical expert. It encourages novelty, and tends towards the evolution of new ideas in design and colour, and a liberation from an excessive dominance of the commercial standard.

From whatever source, however, the carpet manufacturer obtains his ideas for a design, it is by his expert staff, or by a professional carpet designer, that the ideas must be reduced to a practical form. And the technical preparation of designs for carpets is as full of difficulty as it is of interest. As has been indicated, the various makes of carpet differ from each other in many respects, including that of pitch, or number of threads or rows per inch. They all, however, have this in common, that, anatomically so to speak, as regards design, they are reducible to squares of colour. For this reason, ruled or point paper is always employed in the preparation of the design, and preferably paper ruled so as to represent the full size of the woven fabric. The designer, therefore, may not represent the curved outline of a leaf, for instance, with a bold sweep of his brush, but must paint it carefully, square by square, leaving actually an outline, which is more or less jagged according to the coarseness or fineness of the pitch. Here, at once we recognise a limitation which is apt to be irksome to the untrained designer of carpets. And what applies to form applies also to colour. There is no imperceptible graduation of shade to be achieved. Each particular square has to be of one colour and no more. Again, the designer must consider the number of colours he is allowed to employ, be they two or a hundred; and must know whether they can be used anywhere or only in restricted places in the pattern. Then there is the consideration of the repeat, with the mysteries of the straight match, reverse, drop and half drop; of the width of the fabric, body and border; and of the various adjustments of design required for carpets of different sizes, whether breadth goods, Chlidema squares, medallions, or seamless. Last, there is the real artistic imagination that is required; the art of seeing from one repeat how a complete carpet will look, of estimating the difference in appearance between the flat colour on the paper and the richness of the wool; of the variation in value of the same shade in collocation with this or with that. From the above it will be seen that the successful carpet designer has to be both craftsman and artist.

The finished coloured design passes into the hands of the colourist, who, whatever be the nature of the subsequent manufacturing process, will have the responsibility of selecting the coloured yarns to go into the fabric. These will normally, in the first instance, follow the main lines of the shades of the design paper. Then the travellers’ samples are made; and in some fabrics even, where pattern making is not practicable, whole carpets or sets of carpets are produced. Some idea can thus be obtained of the expenses to which carpet manufacturers are put in the preparation of new designs and colourings (which, in pre-war times, used to be done annually, and even more often) before a yard of carpet is sold to recoup them.

The carpet designer and colourist must have strict regard for the limitations of his medium, and in particular the limitations of pitch and of colour. He must know how to employ in the most effective manner, thirty shades or three, and what treatment is best for a floral design or an Oriental, in a fine or a coarse pitch.

Of course, the same laws of colour harmonies and contrasts hold good for the carpet colourist, as for the artist in any other branches of applied art; but the carpet artist has his own particular problems, such as those that have been indicated, and such as arise, for instance, from the fact that carpets have wool surfaces and lie on the floor, and therefore bear quite a different relation to the decoration of a room than curtains or ceilings.

Carpet colourings, apart from plains, may be analysed into self-colour effects, two-colour effects, and effects of three or more colours.

Self-colour or tone-on-tone effects adapt themselves more easily to a scheme of decoration than carpets containing contrasted colours. It seems to be a fact that the carpet is about the last thing to be thought of in a scheme of decoration. It need not be discussed whether it ought to be so or not. The walls, curtains, tiles, etc., are decided upon before the question of the colour of the carpet arises. In such a case, if a harmonious effect is to be ensured, there may be little choice left in the matter; and a self-coloured carpet may be either the easiest way out of the difficulty, or an artistic necessity. Certainly it is easier to furnish to; and, if it does mean a certain want of ambition in the decorative scheme, it is simple and satisfying.

Self-coloured carpets are also eminently suitable for small rooms, especially bed-rooms, on the one hand, and for theatres and music halls on the other, perhaps because one colour is more restful than several.

The number of shades used varies from two to five, according to the simplicity or boldness of the design. More than five are certainly undesirable, as it becomes impossible to get steps of shades without approaching a white at the top and a black at the bottom; and, indeed, some of the most effective self-colours are made in three shades only.

Two-tone effects of contrasted colours are not greatly used. They are sometimes employed in small designs, with two colours only, or three (one and a contrasting pair), but more often in bold designs of the Empire, Adam, or Wedgwood style, with three or four shades of one colour, upon a ground, or working against a pair of shades, of another; but effective combinations on these lines are rare.

By far the largest proportion of carpets made are multi-coloured; and nearly every style and fabric is adaptable to treatment in this way.

It is impossible to deal properly with the question of many-coloured carpets except at great length; but, as a basis, it may be useful to remember that there are only three primary colours, and that in every multi-coloured carpet there should be represented some red, some yellow, and some blue. That is not saying that these should be primaries. The red may be a terra-cotta, the yellow a tan, the blue a slate. But if you have forty shades in a carpet they can all (except, of course, black and white) be scientifically analysed into reds, yellows, and blues, even if some of them are secondaries or tertiaries. That is to say, that, according to its collocation, a purple will be acting either as a blue or as a red, a green either as a yellow or as a blue, and so on. It follows, therefore, that in practice the carpet designer or colourist who has a large range of colours at his disposal will arrange them in sets: a tan with a cream, three blues, two reds and a ruby, and so on.

From this point of view, the manufacturer of Wilton is not so hopelessly outclassed by the maker of Axminster and Chenille. With his five or six colours, irrespective of planting, he can produce an effect which is satisfying, and artistically perfect; though he may have to use one shade, where two or three would give additional softness and richness.

Much, however, depends on the nature of the design; and it is obvious that if it is desired to represent, say, a flower in a naturalistic manner, the fabric that commands a large number of colours, combined with a reasonably fine pitch, will come off best.

A dictum of that eminent art-critic, Owen Jones, may perhaps be appropriately quoted at this point. In a lecture on Decorative Art he writes—

“Carpets should be darker in tone and more broken in line than any portion of a room, both because they present the largest mass of colour, and because they serve as a background to the furniture placed upon them. As a general rule, lighter carpets may be used in rooms thinly furnished than the contrary, as we should otherwise have too overpowering a mass of shade.”

All ornament, according to the source and principle of its design, may be classified as either geometric, naturalistic, or conventional. Ornament of the first class consists of apparently arbitrary arrangements of circles, squares, spirals, or intersecting lines, or repetitions of simple figures. It is the natural form of expression of primitive art, as employed by savages or found on prehistoric remains; but it has been developed in some style, as, for example, the Moorish, into elaborate and beautiful patterns. Naturalistic ornament is that which is closely based upon natural objects, especially flowers and leaves, which are coloured as closely as the limitations of the material permit. Conventional ornament, which may probably be regarded as the highest class, is based upon observation of nature; but the natural forms are not slavishly copied, but conventionalised, in the sense of being selected and simplified, and adapted to the decorative purpose in view.

This classification holds good of carpet design, as for other domains of applied art; and it may be interesting to trace the development of the fashion of carpet decoration with this classification in view.

The geometric style is characteristic of the youthful days of British carpets, and was at its zenith in Early Victorian times. Designs of this class, rather elaborate than simple in drawing, were associated with bright and strongly contrasted colours, while black grounds, at once the most effective and the most difficult of all ground shades, were greatly in vogue. It is interesting to note that of late we have returned to the use of black, for many years an outlaw colour; though it is employed now in a more artistic manner than it was sixty years ago.

With the later Victorian times is associated the development of the naturalistic style in carpets as in other decorative fabrics; flowers, singly or in bouquets, being depicted in bright colours as near to Nature as the technical limitations permitted. This style may perhaps be regarded as flourishing until gradually checked or sobered by conventionalising influences, and notably that of William Morris, to whom, indeed, it is not too much to attribute a revolution in the decorative point of view. But this revolution was both slow and partial; and the naturalistic style, founded, as it is no doubt, upon a love of Nature innate in man, is too deeply rooted ever to lose its popularity completely.

It is still with us. And why not? Flowers, though not meant to be trodden under foot, are round about our feet; and they make a double appeal to the carpet designer of intrinsic beauty, and of fitness for ground decoration. A green ground carpet with pink roses, as near as may be to life, represents no doubt something of the aspiration of the dweller in town for the country; and who shall say that it is unworthy?

Owen Jones is again worth quoting in this connection, even if his strictures seem excessively severe. He says—

“I will say no more on the floral style, but to express a regret that, the more perfect the manufacturing process in carpets becomes, the more do they (the carpets) appear to lend themselves to evil. The modest Kidderminster carpet rarely goes wrong, because it cannot; it has to deal with but two colours, and consequently much mischief is beyond its reach. The Brussels carpet, which deals with five colours, is more mischievous. The Tapestry carpet, where the colours are still more numerous, are vicious in the extreme; whilst the recent invention of printed carpets, with no bounds to its ambition, has become positively criminal.”

But the supremacy of the naturalistic style long since passed away, and gave place towards the end of last century to the conventional, There was a very definite movement in this direction, arising perhaps in the first instance from the Morris influence, but carried forward notably by _The Studio_, the Arts and Crafts Exhibition, and by such artists as C. F. A. Voysey, Walter Crane, G. C. Haité, Arthur Silver, and many others.

The conventional style is particularly suitable to carpets, in that it possesses great decorative possibilities, and continually reminds the occupant of a room of beautiful objects in Nature, without deliberately challenging, as in the naturalistic style, comparisons, which can only be disadvantageous. This style reached the summit of its popularity about the first years of the century and has since declined, though it is by no means extinct. Its decline may be regretted, if only for the reason that it is one of the very few styles of design in carpets which can claim to be distinctly British.

It left behind it a successor, however, which enjoyed a few years of public favour. This is the tapestry or verdure style, wherein flowers, fruit, and leaves are treated in a half-conventional manner, generally on a well-covered ground. This really stands half-way between the naturalistic and the conventional styles. It may be the joint offspring of the two, a more exuberant Morris type, or a more chastened floral chintz; while it seems not unlikely that it was introduced from Germany, where it was certainly very popular at one time.

Then we passed into an era of reproductions. Examples of masterpieces of decoration, and especially those of Oriental art, have always, and rightly, been studied by carpet designers, and frequently reproduced by carpet manufacturers in the past; but never to such an extent as during the years preceding the war. The carpet trade of that time was dominated by the cult of the antique Eastern carpet; and a very large proportion of the production of British carpets was upon Persian and Indian styles, while subsequently the Chinese came in for marked attention. From one point of view, this was all to the good; for the birthplace of the carpet was the Orient, and old Eastern carpets are classics, just as the works of Homer, Vergil, Handel, or Velasquez are classics. Competition among manufacturers was keen; and close and beautiful reproductions of the best antique Oriental carpets were offered to the public, distinguished in design, soft in colouring, and lending themselves readily to harmonious schemes of decoration.

But from another aspect this era was less satisfactory. The masterpieces of Persia and Asia Minor, so eagerly sought out, were not studied as models, to be adapted to modern ideas and requirements, as inspirations, or bases for new effects. They were apt to be slavishly copied, line for line and shade for shade, as far as the limitations of the machine-made fabric permitted. A manufacturer would boast: “This is an exact reproduction of the famous carpet of so-and-so, made in the fourteenth century”; not: “This is a beautiful carpet. Persian in feeling.” This sort of thing did not make for progress, nor for originality and initiative in the design, but led to a certain monotony and arrested progress, though the beauty of the productions was incontestable.

The next stage in the development of carpet design was very interesting. A slight, but inevitable reaction set in against the dominance of close reproductions of Persian and other carpets of the Near East. Carpets in the characteristic decorative styles of other countries, and of other ages, were attempted. The Far East furnished the first departure from the Persian domination; and the rich stores of Chinese and Japanese ornament were drawn upon, with very satisfactory results. Then the carpet manufacturer and designer struck out more boldly, and invaded any land or period whose particular style of decoration could be converted to the artistic purposes of the industry. Louis XIV, Louis XVI, Rococo, Italian Renaissance, Empire, Adam, Georgian, Queen Anne, and other periods were laid under contribution; and it was no less a clear demand on the part of the dealer and the public (to whose share due credit must be given) than a point of honour with the manufacturer, that every design should be pure and true to its particular style. This involved knowledge and study, and tended to restore the designer and colourist to his proper position as a creative artist from that of a mere copyist, to which he had been in some danger of sinking.

The Futurist, Cubist, Vorticist movement, whatever its effect has been in the world of Fine Art, has had but little influence upon carpet design and colour. But perhaps this is yet to come.

There has been one more stage in the development of carpet design, which may be regarded as a part of, but slightly different from, the period-study stage. This may be called the Archaeological. The art of Greece and Rome, apart from the superb acanthus scroll, has left little that lent itself to carpet decoration; but older civilisations have been drawn upon; and the finely conventionalised ornament of Ancient Egypt, Chaldea, and Assyria, has been utilised in harmonious and dignified carpets. Nor is this tendency likely to be arrested, as long as fresh fields can be found that will repay exploration.

All this is extremely healthy and stimulating for the industry. It involves study and effort and originality; and it makes for real progress. The consumer of carpets has been growing more discriminating, just as he has been growing more eclectic. His taste is varied: he may buy a Hamadan design or a Celtic; but he will want it pure in style, and well coloured. He is interested in a little archaeology; but he likes a sound design better than archaeology, and finds a good colouring more important still.

What developments the future holds in store it is impossible to say. It may be that we shall have a reaction from this, eclecticism, this cosmopolitanism of taste, to a more insular vogue; that we shall even evolve a Twentieth Century British style in carpets as characteristic as the Egyptian or the Renaissance.

Meanwhile, some indication has been given of the steps by which the carpet trade has reached the high and varied standard of excellence in design and colour which it enjoys to-day.