The man to blame for your DIY disasters

By Tom Geoghegan
BBC News Magazine

Fed up with spending your weekend on a stepladder? Sick of DIY programmes on telly? Blame William Morris, Victorian designer and socialist.

It's ironic that the man credited for the UK's greatest moment in the history of design, the arch enemy of mass-production, should also be responsible for the nation's obsession with Ikea and home improvement.

When William Morris (above) espoused the ideal of handmade craftsmanship, he feared Victorian industrialisation was killing such skills.

Yet his belief that ordinary people be able to embrace art in their home laid the foundations for the house-proud nation we are today.

See some of the V&A exhibits In pictures

The Arts and Crafts movement, inspired by John Ruskin and first practised by Morris, is the subject of a new exhibition at London's Victoria & Albert Museum.

Ruskin and Morris believed industrialisation had caused three ills - poor standards of design, the decline of traditional craft skills and terrible conditions in slums and factories.

Arts and Crafts integrated decorative art into everyday life and raised the status of craftsmen. It also advocated social reform through improved workshop conditions and a simpler way of life.

The exhibition's 300 Arts and Crafts objects and four specially created rooms show how the movement's popularity has been sustained throughout the 20th Century, especially in upmarket stores such as Heal's and Liberty.

Makeover shows

But how did its ideals lead to the Changing Rooms phenomenon?

Exhibition curator Karen Livingstone says: "The idea of the home being at the heart of the family and decorating them, it's a British phenomenon and the Arts and Crafts movement laid the foundations for that.

"We are terribly proud of our homes and how we decorate them and express ourselves in them."

The status of the craftsman was elevated to that of artist

This is reflected in how big department stores have designer ranges aimed at a mass market, she says.

In the Nineties, the UK reignited its connection with these ideals through an explosion of interest in decorating the home.

Although affluence was a factor, mainly this was fed and led by makeover shows, says television property developer Colin McAllister who teaches people how to decorate their homes, with partner Justin Ryan.

But he says programmes like Changing Rooms have thankfully had their day. "In some ways they've done more damage than good, because they think theming and aquatic bathrooms is design but it's not."

The public appetite for interior design remains strong but it has become "more intelligent" and "property-savvy", moving from DIY to a new culture of DFY - Done For You, he says.

If Morris would be horrified by a global brand like Ikea, he would at least be proud to see this resurgence in beautifying the home.

Arty tea towels

While high quality design had traditionally been limited to aristocratic homes, Morris changed all that, says Amy Clarke of the William Morris Gallery in Walthamstow, east London.

"Only the very wealthy could afford the top of the range, but he tried to make furnishings affordable to everyone, like the rush-seated chair made of ebonised wood," she says. However, some critics say Morris ultimately failed because his objection to mass production was seen as too elitist.

The Beatles were a global phenomenon but Arts and Crafts touched more profound and basic ideas of reform in how we live in the 20th Century Karen Livingstone Exhibition curator

But Morris did fundamentally change the way we think about design, says Ms Livingstone, by creating an interest in it across society.

"That everything in the home should be a work of art, from a tea towel to cutlery. It was about ordinary people and ordinary working lives. That was the ideal, that everyone should have access to good design.

"Today we place a lot of value on handmade things. This is a set of values that still holds true today."

There are also more abstract ways it impacts on modern life, says Ms Livingstone, such as the work-life balance, the longing to escape the stress of the city, and environmental awareness.

He's even credited with prophesising the trend for loft living, having set out his desire to live in "some great room where one talked to one's friends in one corner and ate in another and slept in another and worked in another".

Morris believed everything in the home should be art

But maybe Morris' greatest impact was abroad. Arts and Crafts was adapted by countries across the world, each one adding some local inspiration.

In Norway, for instance, there was the Viking style and in the US the Native American. Some rejected the handmade style for commercial output, but what linked them all was the high quality of production.

"It's a uniquely British movement in its origins and a moment when the rest of the world was looking to Britain for leadership in design," says Ms Livingstone.

"It had a very profound impact which I don't think has ever been matched. The Beatles were a global phenomenon but Arts and Crafts touched more profound and basic ideas of reform in how we live in the 20th Century."

International Arts and Crafts at the V&A from 17 March to 24 July