Liberty of London - history of a famous design shop

Arthur Lasenby Liberty (1843-1917) was born in Bucks. He was employed by Messrs Farmer and Rogers in Regent St, following the hugely successful Inter­national Exhibition in London in May-Nov 1862. By 1874 he decided to start a business of his own. With a £2,000 loan from his fiancée Emma Blackmore’s father in 1875, he leased half a shop in Regent St, with 3 staff. His plans for the business centred on decorative arts and fabrics from distant lands.

The Regent St shop opened during 1875, at first selling only col­oured silks imported from the East. This proved so successful that Liberty repaid the loan, took over the other half of the shop and began to sell a much wider variety of goods from the Far and Near East. As the business grew, neighbouring properties were bought and added. In 1884 he introduced the costume department, directed by architect Edward William Godwin (1833–86), who was a founding mem­ber of The Costume Society. He and Arthur Liberty created in-house apparel to challenge the fashions of Paris.

Liberty wanted exotic Oriental and Moorish objects to sell, and he was delighted in time to welcome keen young designers who created exotica. With Christopher Dresser, Archibald Knox designed metal ware for the Silver Studio, which also supplied Liberty & Co.

In Nov 1885, Liberty brought villagers from India to stage a living village of Indian artisans. His Regent St emporium was already overflowing with Oriental metalwork and lacquer, exotic Eastern fabrics and medieval-ish German pewter art.

In 1885, Regent St serviced the growing demand for carpets and furniture. The basement was named the Eastern Bazaar, the site for Decorative Furnishing Objects. He named the prop­erty Chesham House, after the place in which he grew up. The shop became the most fash­ionable place to shop in London, and Liberty fabrics were used for both clothing and fur­nishings. Clients included famous Pre-Raphaelite artists.

Liberty's Great Marlborough St shop
Built 1924 and extended later.

Liberty's interior central atrium

surr­ounded by smaller furnished rooms

In the 1890s, Liberty built strong relationships with many English designers, including Archibald Knox, men who practised the Arts and Crafts style. By then Knox had become the principal designer for all of Liberty’s Celtic Revival metalwork and jewellery.

Liberty also helped develop Art Nouveau through his encouragement of the best designers. The company became associated with Art Nouv­eau to the extent that in Italy, Art Nouveau became known as Stile Liberty, in honour of the London shop.

In 1899, Liberty & Co showed two small collections of silver ob­jects and silver jewel­lery bearing their own assay mark, first at the shop and then at the 1899 Arts and Crafts Exhibition at New Gallery in 121 Regent St. This 1899 exhibit was even more special because it featured a William Morris retrospective.

Another factor introducing continental Art Nouveau to elegant English families was Liberty’s custom of buying products directly from Europe. Furniture was imported from France, ceramics were delivered from Hungary and WMF pewter from Germany arrived by the crate load. As long as the objects were well designed, would-be customers were happy with mass produced objects.

Importantly for me, Liberty worked with William Morris, who designed some of their best-known prints. Look at the link to the Dovecot Studios, founded in 1912 after the weavers had learned their craft at Morris’ Merton Abbey workshops in Wimbledon. In Morris’ day, art and fashion were inextricably linked, with women encour­aged to seek inspiration for new styles in the Pre-Raphaelite art of John Everett Millais, Dante Gabriel Rossetti and William Holman Hunt etc. Women loos­ened corsets, bodices and waistlines in favour of the flowy styles whose influence lasted!

Liberty's collection of ornaments, fabric and objets d'art from around the world proved irresistible to a society fascinated by Jap­an and the East, and Liberty produced a social change in int­er­ior design and dress. 

Liberty prints

In 1922, the builders received £198,000 to build the splendid Great Marlborough St shop, designed by Edwin T Hall and Son. Rec­or­ds sh­ow­ed 24,000+ cubic feet of ship-timbers were used eg the HMS Impr­egnable and the HMS Hindustan, which measured the length and height of the Liberty building. The realisation of Arthur Lib­erty's original vision arrived in 1924, alas 7 years after he died.

The 1920s was a time of Tudor revival, the most English of archit­ecture, so the shop was engineered around 3 atria. Specifically designed to feel like a (rather stately) home, each atrium was surr­ounded by smaller rooms, complete with fireplaces and furnishings.

Always a source of craftsmanship, Liberty had a furniture workshop in Archway London. Run by Lawrence Turner, the workshop produced Liberty Arts and Crafts furniture and the intricately carved panels and pillars found throughout the shop. The craftsmen allowed the fantasy of ensuring that every ornament was a one-off.

Liberty’s statue stands at the ent­rance to his emporium. The building is now a Heritage-listed London icon and is still famed for its design & cultural collab­orat­ions. The dedicated in-house design studio is still at the heart of hand painting and of beautiful prints, some reworked from the archives.

The iconic shop in Lon­d­on’s West End was famous for its luxury goods, fashion, cosmetics, interior design, and for its graphic and floral prints. Sonia Del­aunay’s colourful abstract designs must have been very appealing;  her influence is everywhere. Plus Liberty played a major role in the popularity of art styles like the Arts and Craft movement; six floors of contemporary design and beautiful wares from the world's greatest crafts-people.

Linda Parry's 2013 book, William Morris Textiles
Liberty involved William Morris and other famous C19th artists in his fabric designs.