ESSEX & Co. Ld. An exquisite sample book catalogue of over 330 wallpaper designs plus borders and reliefs. Dated 1923, the same year in which the firm was bought by Sanderson. The catalogue contains over 330 designs, usually printed verso, from design patent 2001 to 2338, covering ‘cameoid’ designs—raised materials for relief decoration, similar to Anaglypta—and then into an extensive array of patterns and designs with wide-ranging use of colour, with nods to the Arts and Crafts movement, the Art Nouveau, and moving towards Art Deco or modernist styles, some of which to our own contemporary eye might be mistaken to be in keeping with 1930s design, this in itself an ode to the innovation of the company, it being ahead of its time.
R. Walter Essex founded the company, Essex and Co. He commissioned accomplished artist and designer, Charles F. A. Voysey in around 1893 to produce various wallpaper designs over the following decades. Many styles here may have been designed by Voysey, or are otherwise certainly after him. The designs cover wallpapers for most house styles and most rooms, from elaborate floral designs in the ‘Morris chintz’ style to modernist bright one- and two-tone colours, from Chinese- and Japanese-inspired designs featuring flora and fauna, and even faux tile wallpaper for bathrooms feature heavily towards the rear. The company established itself as a leading specialist in ‘art wallpaper’, and is perhaps second only to William Morris & Co. as for influential British wallpaper firms of this period.
Oblong thick 4to. Firm blue cloth boards with riveted leather straps to spine and leather clasp to fore-edge, this present but inoperative. The covers marked and stained, a little bowed and nibbled at towards foot, the inside hinge slightly showing at gutter, the endpapers slightly toned and again nibbled at at fore-edge. The samples themselves mostly fine, two loose and folded though these may be spare samples, and a small handful creased and marked, but again, most pleasingly vibrant. An exceptional, much superior example of 20s wallpaper design and manufacture. More images on request.
ESSEX & Co. Ld. An exquisite sample book catalogue of over 330 wallpaper designs plus borders and reliefs. Dated 1923, the same year in which the firm was bought by Sanderson. The catalogue contains over 330 designs, usually printed verso, from design patent 2001 to 2338, covering ‘cameoid’ designs—raised materials for relief decoration, similar to Anaglypta—and then into an extensive array of patterns and designs with wide-ranging use of colour, with nods to the Arts and Crafts movement, the Art Nouveau, and moving towards Art Deco or modernist styles, some of which to our own contemporary eye might be mistaken to be in keeping with 1930s design, this in itself an ode to the innovation of the company, it being ahead of its time.
R. Walter Essex founded the company, Essex and Co. He commissioned accomplished artist and designer, Charles F. A. Voysey in around 1893 to produce various wallpaper designs over the following decades. Many styles here may have been designed by Voysey, or are otherwise certainly after him. The designs cover wallpapers for most house styles and most rooms, from elaborate floral designs in the ‘Morris chintz’ style to modernist bright one- and two-tone colours, from Chinese- and Japanese-inspired designs featuring flora and fauna, and even faux tile wallpaper for bathrooms feature heavily towards the rear. The company established itself as a leading specialist in ‘art wallpaper’, and is perhaps second only to William Morris & Co. as for influential British wallpaper firms of this period.
Oblong thick 4to. Firm blue cloth boards with riveted leather straps to spine and leather clasp to fore-edge, this present but inoperative. The covers marked and stained, a little bowed and nibbled at towards foot, the inside hinge slightly showing at gutter, the endpapers slightly toned and again nibbled at at fore-edge. The samples themselves mostly fine, two loose and folded though these may be spare samples, and a small handful creased and marked, but again, most pleasingly vibrant. An exceptional, much superior example of 20s wallpaper design and manufacture. More images on request.
