New William Morris Exhibition Opens at Kelmscott House
Collection of objects donated by Helena Stephenson on display
Left: 'Pink and Poppy' original design. Right: 'Pink and Poppy' wallpaper, The William Morris Society Collection
September 17, 2024
A new exhibition at The William Morris Society’s Museum in Hammersmith features a range of new items collected by an enthusiastic admirer of the Victorian designer, poet and socialist.
Collecting Morris: Highlights from the Helena Stephenson Collection runs from 14 September through to 13 April 2025 and includes original hand-drawn designs for commercial wallpapers, custom commissions, and textiles.
Helena Stephenson was a friend of his daughter designer May Morris who retrieved items from the Morris & Co. offices in 1940 upon dissolution of the firm. She not only saved these precious items of decorative art history, but she also William Morris’s Hammersmith on Upper Mall. She and her husband Morton purchased the riverside property in 1925 to save it from being converted into a boat house.
The Stephenson’s lived happily in the house for the next 47 years. Helena died in 1972 having bequeathed the house to The William Morris Society who retain the basement rooms and coach house as a museum, shop and space for workshops, talks and events.
The exhibition includes highlights from Helena’s life in the house and explores the impact of her generous legacy for The William Morris Society to this day.
The exhibition is free and is open on Thursdays, Saturdays and Sundays from 2-5pm.
It takes place in the Coach House, Kelmscott House, 26 Upper Mall, Hammersmith, W6 9TA.
The Coach House, Kelmscott House on Upper Mall
The William Morris Society exists to make better known the life, work and ideas of William Morris, designer, craftsman, poet and socialist. The Society’s premises are in the Coach House and basement of Kelmscott House, Morris’s Hammersmith home for the last 18 years of his life.
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