ABSTRACT
J. Scarratt Rigby was a designer of textiles and wallpapers in the arts and craft mode for well-known companies including GP & J Baker, A.H. Lee of Birken-head, and Liberty and Co., and was the honorary secretary of the Society of Designers. The impossibility of dealing with the subject of present-day decorative arts without constant reference to the work of William Morris will readily be admitted by most people. Morris found himself at a time when English decorative arts seemed to have just passed its lowest ebb—in the decade following the exhibition of 1851—among a group of artists remarkably and happily in unison in their desire to bring more colour and interest into such work. Addressing themselves to the gigantic task of reforming the decorative art of the time, the association found themselves compelled to face and deal with a number of distinct crafts.
