Design for Curtains 1841 - 1900

Curator: This delicate drawing, entitled "Design for Curtains," comes to us from Charles Hindley and Sons. It seems to have been created sometime between 1841 and 1900. Editor: Ah, yes, quite airy, isn't it? A whispered promise of opulence. The gentle watercolor washes and meticulous pencil lines evoke a sense of poised domesticity. What do we know about Hindley and Sons? Curator: They were, I suppose, a leading firm of decorators and cabinet makers in 19th century London. Editor: I see in this piece an interesting tension. The almost architectural rendering of the window, coupled with the luxurious, draping fabric… it speaks to a time when even the most intimate spaces were sites of careful social performance. Consider the gaze it frames--who looks in, who looks out, and who is privileged to see such beauty? Curator: It does suggest a certain social stratification, doesn’t it? These are not the curtains of the working class. What strikes me is how even a design on paper carries a weight of expectation, the unseen client, perhaps flipping through sketches like this. Did this ever make it off the page, I wonder? Editor: Indeed! The ghostly presence of a grand interior, conjured up. It makes me think about the labor involved—the unseen hands that would have crafted those tassels, the complex weaving… a silent symphony of exploited skill, for whom these windows and their view would have remained cruelly inaccessible. Curator: A somewhat melancholy thought! Although, as a creative gesture, I love the confidence of those repeating scallops. It is what it needs to be to perform. It sets up a language and communicates it well, so the manufacturer gets it and someone in a well-lit drawing room feels able to say, "yes, that is just the thing for my parlor." Editor: The design’s elegant linearity certainly speaks to the aspirational values of the period. In a way, this innocuous drawing acts as a portal into the intricate hierarchies and desires of Victorian society. Curator: It is lovely to think, now that you mention it, that it takes just a delicate wash and the graphite for all these questions about design, privilege, and unseen labors to rise to the surface and start to mean so much more.