Morris at Merton
A lecture from the UK by John Hawks
Sunday January 22, 2023, 12PM EST
Zoom Lecture
"The
Pond at Merton Abbey" or "The Pond at William Morris's Works at Merton"
by L. L. Pocock, watercolour, now in the Victoria & Albert Museum.
William Morris acquired the old silk works at Merton Abbey Mills in June
1881 and relocated the workshops of Morris & Co. to Merton.
In 1881 William Morris moved his weaving, dyeing and stained glass works to picturesque old buildings in Merton, then a village in South London near Wimbledon. The works continued there for another 44 years after his death, finally closing in 1940. They were known as the “Merton Abbey works” because this had once been the historic site of a major priory - which would certainly have appealed to the passionate medievalist in Morris, though more important to him was the water quality of the River Wandle which flows through Merton, a chalk stream ideal for his traditional processes. This period of his life and achievement is described by John Hawks, a trustee of the Wandle Industrial Museum and Merton Priory Trust.
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