I first encountered William Morris (1834–1896) during my A-levels when I was studying Art, a subject that was always my first choice before I gradually gravitated toward politics and history. There, among images of densely patterned wallpapers and tapestries, I discovered not just a designer but a complete philosophy about how we should live, work, and create. His influence on my thinking has never waned.
A Victorian Polymath
Morris was born into a wealthy Essex family and discovered his passion for medievalism while studying classics at Exeter College, Oxford. There he befriended Edward Burne-Jones, beginning associations with Pre-Raphaelite artists including Dante Gabriel Rossetti and architect Philip Webb. Webb designed Red House for Morris and his wife Jane Burden, where they lived from 1859 to 1865.
Morris was a Victorian polymath, designer, poet, novelist, translator, and socialist activist, but what makes him extraordinary is how seamlessly he wove these identities together. For Morris, there was no separation between art and life, between beauty and utility, between the aesthetic and the political. This holistic vision, radical in the 1880s, feels remarkably relevant today.
Beauty and Utility
His central belief was disarmingly simple: have nothing in your houses that you do not know to be useful or believe to be beautiful. This wasn’t about minimalism or austerity. Rather, Morris argued for a world where everyday objects, the chairs we sit on, the curtains at our windows, the cups we drink from, should be thoughtfully crafted and beautiful. He despised the shoddy mass-produced goods flooding Victorian Britain, seeing them as symptomatic of a deeper malaise: a society that had separated workers from the joy of creation.
John Ruskin profoundly shaped Morris’s thinking, particularly through “On the Nature of Gothic Architecture” in The Stones of Venice, which Morris called “one of the very few necessary and inevitable utterances of the century.” From Ruskin, Morris adopted the rejection of industrial manufacturing in favour of hand-craftsmanship, elevating artisans to artists and advocating for affordable, handmade art without hierarchies between mediums.
The Arts and Crafts Movement
The Arts and Crafts movement that Morris championed was fundamentally about human dignity. He believed that factory production degraded workers, turning them into mere cogs in a machine, repeating mindless tasks divorced from creativity or pride. His vision of craft-based production wasn’t nostalgic romanticism, it was a radical reimagining of labour itself. Work, he insisted, should be a source of fulfilment, not merely survival.
In 1861, Morris co-founded Morris, Marshall, Faulkner & Co. with Burne-Jones, Rossetti, Webb, and others. The firm revolutionized Victorian interior design through Morris’s tapestries, wallpapers, fabrics, furniture, and stained glass, becoming hugely fashionable. Morris took sole control in 1875, renaming it Morris & Co.
His nature-inspired designs, those sinuous stems, intricate flowers, and medieval-influenced patterns, remain ubiquitous, adorning everything from Liberty fabrics to contemporary homeware. But beyond their aesthetic appeal, they represent Morris’s deep respect for the natural world, another aspect of his thinking that speaks urgently to our moment.
Socialism and Community
Morris’s socialism was no drawing-room affectation, it was passionately lived. In 1883, he joined the Social Democratic Federation before founding the Socialist League, throwing himself into street-corner speeches, organizing meetings, and even facing arrest for his activism. He surrounded himself with radical thinkers and artists: Eleanor Marx, daughter of Karl Marx, became a close comrade; Edward Burne-Jones remained his lifelong friend and artistic collaborator despite occasional political tensions; and his Kelmscott Press brought together craftspeople and intellectuals committed to beautiful, accessible books.
Morris’s utopian novel News from Nowhere painted his vision of a future society without class distinctions, where work was voluntary and joyful. For Morris, socialism and craft were inseparable, both were about human liberation, about creating conditions where everyone could develop their creative capacities rather than being crushed by poverty or soul-destroying labour.
An Enduring Legacy
What captivates me most is how Morris’s ideas transcend their Victorian context. Today, as we grapple with fast fashion, planned obsolescence, and the environmental costs of endless consumption, Morris’s call for quality over quantity resonates powerfully. His emphasis on sustainability, making things that last, that can be repaired, that connect us to makers and materials, feels prescient.
Morris wasn’t without contradictions. His handcrafted goods were often too expensive for ordinary people, despite his socialist convictions. Yet his fundamental questions endure: What is good work? How do we create a society where everyone can flourish? How do we balance beauty, utility, and justice?
Nearly 130 years after his death (3 October), William Morris remains an important figure for many, reminding us about sustainability, equity, compassion, and the beauty of the everyday objects that surround us.
BAGICHA 