Roses in William Morris Designs

Where Roses Appear: The Named Designs

Four documented objects carry the rose in their title or description. The Victoria and Albert Museum holds an embroidered panel titled 'Olive and Rose', museum number O1803073, which the V&A attributes to William Morris and dates to around 1880. The Metropolitan Museum of Art lists a wallpaper called 'Pink and Rose', accession number 23.163.4a, with William Morris as designer, dated ca. 1890 and block-printed in distemper colors. The Met also holds a printed cotton titled 'Rose and Thistle', accession number 23.163.9, again with Morris as designer according to the Met record, designed before April 1881 and printed 1917 to 1923.

The fourth example mixes roses with other plants. A tablecloth in the V&A, museum number O89466, of linen with silk embroidery and dated 1896, shows a central cartouche of vine leaves and trailing stems, a row of carnation heads and rose branches, and corner ogee devices of tulip plants. The V&A records it as probably designed by May Morris, worked by Mrs Laurence Hodson or in the Morris and Co. workshops. Here the roses are confirmed by the museum's own description of the design, not by the title alone.

The rose-named designs in the record, with their institutions:

• 'Olive and Rose', embroidery, V&A O1803073, designed by William Morris, ca. 1880 flowers in Morris designs
• 'Pink and Rose', wallpaper, Met 23.163.4a, William Morris as designer, ca. 1890, block-printed in distemper colors
• 'Rose and Thistle', printed cotton, Met 23.163.9, William Morris as designer, designed before April 1881, printed 1917 to 1923
• Tablecloth with rose branches, V&A O89466, linen with silk embroidery, 1896, probably designed by May Morris

One caution before going further. The Met records for 'Pink and Rose' and 'Rose and Thistle' give titles, dates and makers, but the supplied records contain no visual description of their patterns. The rose in those cases rests on the title. Only 'Olive and Rose' and the 1896 tablecloth in the V&A (O89466) have documented descriptions of what the motif looks like.

How the Rose Was Drawn and Stitched

The best documented rose design on this page is an embroidery, and its making explains a whole branch of Morris's textile work. According to the V&A, from about 1876 Morris designed a series of small square embroidery panels usually sold as kits, with an inked design outlined on plain cloth to be stitched at home in floss silks.

'Olive and Rose' fits that model. The V&A dates the design to ca. 1880 and attributes it to William Morris. According to the V&A, the panel was produced as a kit by the Morris & Co. workroom in London and completed by an unknown amateur embroiderer, so the stitched object records both the firm's design and an unnamed stitching hand.

The materials are recorded too. The V&A describes the panel as worked in floss silk thread on cotton ground fabric, stitched in pale green and cream with a pink background. That palette is the firm's documentation, not an editorial judgement, and it gives a concrete sense of how the rose and its companion olive read in thread rather than on paper.

This matters for attribution. A kit panel of this type should be described precisely: designed by Morris, stitched by an unknown hand.

Design-by-Design Examples

The table below gathers every rose-related object in the record, with attributions as the V&A and the Metropolitan Museum of Art give them, separating the designs attributed to William Morris from the tablecloth the V&A records as probably designed by May Morris. Dates and attributions follow the holding institutions' records.

Note the different kinds of object in the list. The V&A records that 'Olive and Rose' was produced as a kit by the Morris & Co. workroom in London and completed by an unknown amateur embroiderer, and that the 1896 tablecloth was worked by Mrs Laurence Hodson or in the Morris and Co. workshops. The Met objects are a wallpaper and a printed cotton. Treating them as one category hides how the same motif moved through different hands.

Names That Sound Like Roses but Are Not

At least two objects in the record could mislead a reader hunting for roses. The first is the V&A's furnishing fabric 'Dutchess Rose', museum number O294432, of woven wool. According to the V&A, it was woven in West Germany in 1986 for UNIKA VAEV, USA, after a design by William Morris. The name contains Rose, but the design does not: the V&A describes it as closely based on the 1876 Morris design 'Crown Imperial', showing an ogee repeating motif of large Crown Imperial lily heads. Nothing in the record establishes that it shows roses at all.

The underlying design has its own history. The V&A records that the original 'Crown Imperial' was woven in two scales, as a woven cotton fabric and as woven wool and mohair called 'Mohair Damask'. A reader following the rose should follow the lily instead here.

The second case is the Met's textile titled 'Roses', accession number 26.72.5, designed by Paul Iribe, dated 1914, in silk and metal thread. The record gives no connection to Morris or Morris & Co., and none should be assumed. Iribe was a designer of a later generation, and a shared title is not a shared lineage.

The misleading cases, briefly:

• 'Dutchess Rose' (V&A O294432): a 1986 weaving after 'Crown Imperial'; the described motif is Crown Imperial lily heads, not roses.
• 'Roses' (Met 26.72.5): designed by Paul Iribe, 1914; no documented link to Morris.
• 'Pink and Rose' and 'Rose and Thistle': the Met records supply titles, makers and dates, but no visual description of the motifs, so the rose rests on the name.

What the Record Does Not Establish

No supplied source contains any writing by Morris about roses. Nothing on record ties the motif to a statement in his own words, so this page cannot quote him on it, and it will not paraphrase a quotation into existence.

No interpretation of the rose motif by a named author is on record either. Under this journal's rules, symbolic meaning needs a sourced writer behind it, and none is available here. What can be said is what the museum records say: which objects carry the motif, how they were made, and by whom they were designed. That is description, and it is enough for now.

Related Plant Motifs

In the 1896 tablecloth recorded by the V&A, the rose branches appear alongside a row of carnation heads and corner devices of tulip plants, all held together by vine leaves and trailing stems. A study of one plant quickly becomes a study of the planting scheme around it.

For the wider picture, see our guide to Tulips in William Morris designs, which follows the tulip plants that share the tablecloth with the roses, and Pomegranates in detail for another fruiting motif that recurs across the firm's output. The parent guide to flowers in Morris designs gathers the whole series in one place.