The Garden at Red House and Its Influence on Morris's Patterns

The short answer

Red House was Philip Webb's first house, designed in 1859 and completed in 1860 near Upton, now Bexleyheath, in Kent. The garden belongs to that same project. According to the National Trust, the design of the garden was as important to William Morris as the house, and he believed the two should work together in harmony.

The National Trust also records that some of the garden's design has been lost over the years, even though the garden has still blossomed. So the short answer to the history question is: a garden conceived alongside the house designed in 1859 and completed in 1860, valued by Morris as part of a single design, and partially altered or lost since.

Red House: the house that came first

The Victoria and Albert Museum holds a contract drawing of the north, south and detail elevations for Red House, Upton, Bexleyheath, dated 1859. According to the V&A, the house was designed by Philip Webb for William Morris, and the drawing is signed by Webb and by the builder, William Kent.

Red House was Webb's first house. The National Trust and the V&A both date the design to 1859 and completion to 1860, at a site near Upton in what is now Bexleyheath, Kent. The building came first in the documentary record, and the garden was planned around it rather than added later.

The house was meant to grow. The V&A records that in 1864 Webb designed an additional wing to make room for Edward Burne-Jones and his wife Georgie. His initial proposal was judged too expensive, he produced a second, reduced scheme, and in the end neither scheme was built.

Red House was a family home for Morris and his wife Jane and the hub of an artistic community. Edward Burne-Jones described it as the beautifullest place on earth.

What the evidence shows about the garden

The National Trust describes the Red House garden as a small oasis on the London-Kent border, with a variety of flowers and plants reminiscent of William Morris's time there, and with the house and garden working in harmony. That phrase, harmony, is the Trust's own framing, and it matches the idea recorded in its account that the garden was designed to clothe the house.

According to the National Trust, the design of the garden was as important to Morris as the house, and he believed they should work together. The Trust also states plainly that through the years some of the garden's design has been lost, but that the garden has still blossomed. Those two statements together are the core of the documented history: an original conception, and a partial loss of it over time.

Inside the house, the National Trust notes original features and furniture by Morris and Philip Webb, stained glass and paintings by Burne-Jones, and embroidery by Jane and Elizabeth Burden. The rooms, the Trust says, give a unique view of William and Janey's life and of the establishment of what later became Morris & Co. The garden sits in that same context: part of a deliberately complete domestic world.

It is just as important to state what the records do not show. The available sources do not establish who designed the garden, when it was laid out in detail, what specific plants or features formed the original scheme, or where exactly the garden sits in relation to the house. Any account that fills those gaps is going beyond the evidence.

'Trellis': the pattern closest to a garden subject

The Victoria and Albert Museum holds the wallpaper Trellis, block-printed in distemper colours on paper. The V&A's description records a thorned rose bush with red flowers growing on a wooden trellis, with birds and flying insects, on a pale blue ground. Of the patterns discussed on this page, it is the one whose subject is most directly a garden image, and it sits naturally within the wider study of flowers in Morris designs flowers in Morris designs.

Attribution matters here. According to the V&A, Trellis was designed by William Morris, and the birds were designed by Philip Webb. The pattern was the first paper designed by Morris, though the third to be issued, which is a useful reminder that design order and issue order are not the same thing.

The dates need care. The V&A's record states that Trellis was designed in 1862 and registered and produced in 1864. The same record lists further dates, November 1862 and January or February 1864, without stating which applies to the object itself, so the safe summary is the one the V&A gives in its description: designed 1862, registered and produced 1864.

The V&A holds a second example of Trellis, museum number O248458, in a predominantly grey-green colourway. In that version the record describes a flowering thorned rose bush without stating the flower colour, so the red flowers belong to the pale blue version's description rather than to the pattern as a whole.

The rose on a trellis, with birds borrowed from Webb, is a garden subject in the most literal sense, and it raises the question of how far Morris's plant imagery was drawn from life, which is examined in detail in our piece on botanical accuracy in Morris botanical accuracy in Morris in detail.

One limit should be stated clearly: the available sources do not establish that Trellis depicts the Red House garden itself, nor do they name any other specific Morris pattern said to reflect that garden. The connection between the garden and Morris's wider patterns rests on the documented fact that he valued the garden as part of the whole design of Red House, not on a recorded link for each pattern.

Common misconceptions and open questions

Because Red House is well loved, assumptions about its garden tend to outrun the record. The National Trust's own account, which stresses both the original harmony of house and garden and the loss of parts of the design, leaves several questions open.

These points are often assumed but are not established by the sources used here:

• The designer of the garden is not named in the available records, and the date the garden was laid out is not documented in detail.
• No specific writing by Morris about the Red House garden appears in the evidence used for this page.
• The specific plants, flowers or garden features of the original design are not recorded in the sources consulted here.
• Beyond Trellis, no specific Morris pattern is named in these sources as depicting or illustrating the Red House garden, and no source is given for that connection.
• The original source of the phrase clothe the house, as used by the National Trust, is not identified in the record.
• The exact position, size and layout of the garden relative to the house are not established by the available evidence.

None of this makes the garden less interesting. It means the honest history is shorter than the legend, and that questions about planting and layout belong to future research rather than to this page.

Why the garden matters for understanding Morris's work

Three documented threads come together at Red House. The first is the conception of house and garden as one design, which the National Trust attributes to Morris's own belief that they should work in harmony. The second is the house's role as a family home and the hub of an artistic community, with rooms that the Trust says give a unique view of the establishment of what later became Morris & Co.

The third thread is the wallpaper. Trellis, held by the V&A, shows a thorned rose bush on a wooden trellis with birds and flying insects, and it was the first paper Morris designed. A garden subject at the very start of his wallpaper work, made for a household whose garden was planned as part of the whole, is as close as the record comes to linking the place and the patterns.

The interior record reinforces the picture of a complete designed environment: original features and furniture by Morris and Webb, stained glass and paintings by Burne-Jones, and embroidery by Jane and Elizabeth Burden. Garden, house and contents were all part of the same project.

For readers who want to go further, the botanical guide explains how flowers work in Morris's designs generally, from individual motifs to full pattern structures the botanical guide to flowers in William Morris designs.