by C. F.A. Voysey and David E. Berman
First off, a little history about C. F. A. Voysey: he was an English architect and designer of the second generation of the British Arts & Crafts Movement. Voysey followed on the heels of William Morris and Charles Locke Eastlake, and was a contemporary of Charles Rennie Mackintosh. Think of these gents and their peers as Great Britain's answer to France's Art Nouveau and Germany's Jugendstil.
Secondly, let me introduce David E. Berman of Trustworth Studios. David is a Voysey fanatic: he has taught himself woodworking, metalsmithing, finishing and any other skill that might allow him to reproduce Voysey's designs. He started with furniture and lighting, but now he focuses on creating Voysey's wallpaper and fabrics.
David has been a dear friend of mine since the early 1990s when I worked in the eastern part of the state and had a long commute. I would stay over at his place twice a week, and we shared many a dinner and occasionally went on historic interior design calls together. Our exploits are the fodder for my second book, which hopefully will be published in the coming year or so.
Back to the lace: Cooper's Cottage Lace has always sought to approach the finest contemporary Arts and Crafts Movement artisans and ask them to design our Artful Lace curtains. David obliged with one of his favorites, The Oak and Acorn. It's a wallpaper design, and you can see Voysey's watercolor for it here:
(David would be delighted to print this for you in any color and scale, as that is Trustworth's speciality.) We decided that using a symmetrical mirror image would look nicer for a lace panel, so David flipped it, and this is the resulting image:
He then added a pin-stripe border, and I had it woven in Scotland in 100% cotton Madras Weave. We're both delighted with the way it turned out, and I'm so happy to be able to add it to our line of Arts and Crafts Lace Curtains.
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