Daisy (Cream)
1864 · Block-printed wallpaper, distemper colours on paper · The Metropolitan Museum of Art
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About this work
- Artist
- William Morris (1834–1896)
- Year
- 1864
- Medium
- Block-printed wallpaper, distemper colours on paper
- Original size
- 68.6 × 54.6 cm (sheet)
- Collection
- The Metropolitan Museum of Art
- Movement
- Arts and Crafts
Rows of small flowering plants stand on a cream ground flecked with fine grass-like strokes: orange-gold daisies, coral and white blooms and pale green leaf rosettes, repeated in a simple, front-facing arrangement. Daisy was the second wallpaper William Morris designed but the first to be put into production, in 1864. The V&A traces its flat, frontal motif to a wall hanging pictured in a fifteenth-century illuminated manuscript of Froissart's Chronicles in the British Library, a sign of how closely Morris's early work drew on medieval art. Like his other early papers it was printed for him by Jeffrey & Co. from hand-cut wooden blocks in distemper, a water-based paint with a soft, chalky surface. This cream colourway, warm with orange and coral, comes from a sheet acquired by the Metropolitan Museum of Art in 1923.
This print fills the sheet edge to edge with the pattern, cropped from a high-resolution museum scan of the original, so it reads like a panel of the wallpaper or fabric. The exhibition poster shows the whole sample. The design is in the public domain.
Where it works
Orange-gold and coral daisies in neat rows on cream make a cheerful, light pattern for a kitchen, nursery or sunny landing. Hang it beside Daisy (Green) as a two-colour pair at 12×18 each in natural wood.
Style, size & framing detail
- Style
- Arts and Crafts pattern
- Era
- 19th century (1864)
- Orientation
- Portrait
- Mood
- decorative, classic
- Rooms
- kitchen, hallway or entryway, nursery
Size. We'd hang this one at 12×18. Prints at 12×18, 16×24 in — 12×18 for a shelf, desk or a gallery-wall grid; 16×24 above a desk, console or in a hallway.
Framing. Printed edge to edge: a slim black or natural wood frame right to the pattern, or let the canvas wrap do the framing. Also available gallery-wrapped on canvas, ready to hang with no frame.
Pairing. Hangs alone or as a matched pair; three or more prints are 10% off.
