INDUSTRIES 



During the last century inspiration was 

 obtained from many eminent artists, of whom 

 it is unnecessary to mention more than A. W. 

 Pugin, H. Shaw, Owen Jones, William 

 Morris, William Burges, and C. L. Eastlake. 

 Among the firms which have honestly endea- 

 voured to lead and improve public taste in 

 furniture and have gained a high reputation 

 for the quality of their work are Gillow's, 

 Jeffrey, Jackson & Graham, Grace, Shoolbred, 

 and Trollope & Sons. The list might be 

 considerably increased. 



With regard to the system of production, 

 valuable information is afforded in Charles 

 Booth's Life and Labour of the People in London^* 

 The districts comprise Shoreditch, Bethnal 

 Green, Hackney, and the Tower Hamlets. 

 The Curtain Road district in Shoreditch is 

 the chief market of the trade and the centre 

 of its distribution. ' From the East-end 

 workshops,' says Mr. Booth, ' produce goes 

 out of every description, from the richly in- 

 laid cabinet that may be sold for jCioo or 

 the carved chair that can be made to pass 

 as rare " antique " workmanship, down to the 

 gypsy tables that the maker sells for 9*. a dozen 

 or the cheap bedroom suites and duchesse tables 

 that are now flooding the market.' 15 



The producers fall into four main groups. 

 The first class, that of the factories, forms 

 but an insignificant portion of the trade, there 

 being not more than three or four large fac- 



tories with elaborate machinery, where from 

 about 50 to 190 men are employed. They 

 supply the large dealers in the Tottenham 

 Court Road, in the provinces, or in the 

 colonies. The second class, that of the larger 

 workshops, comprises shops in which from 

 15 to 25 men are generally employed. Here 

 the best East-end furniture is made, but the 

 number of first-class shops is very small, many 

 good firms having been obliged to give up 

 altogether in recent years through the prevail- 

 ing demand for cheapness. In the third class 

 are the small makers, masters who employ from 

 4 to 8 men in small workshops, either built 

 behind the house or away from it, sometimes 

 even in the houses themselves. 'As a general 

 rule the larger shops turn out the better work. 

 But even among the small men excellent 

 work is done, in the same way that large 

 shops often turn out cheap and inferior goods.' 18 

 These small men sell at the nearest market, 

 that is, the Curtain Road and its district ; 

 here they can be sure of getting cash, whilst 

 the West-end shops and the provincial trade 

 take credit, which the small maker can rarely 

 afford to give. In a fourth class are the inde- 

 pendent workers. These are mostly found 

 among the turners, carvers, fret-cutters, and 

 sawyers, and are not a large class. Other 

 special classes described by Mr. Booth are 

 chair makers, looking-glass frame makers, 

 carvers, french polishers, and upholsterers. 



POTTERY 



The most famous of Middlesex industries 

 is certainly its pottery, but few traces can be 

 found of any local manufacture before the 

 1 7th century. Down to the latter half of 

 that century English home-made pottery was 

 of a very rude kind, and consisted chiefly 

 of common domestic vessels, 1 such as large 

 coarse dishes, tygs, pitchers, bowls, cups, and 

 other similar articles. Vessels of stoneware 

 of greater durability and more artistic work- 

 manship were imported from abroad. Among 

 these were the bellarmines or grey-beards and 

 ale-pots, which were largely imported from 

 Germany and Flanders. 



In 1570 two potters, 2 named Jasper Andries 

 and Jacob Janson, who had settled in Nor- 



14 (1902) Ser. I, iv, 157 et seq. 



" Ibid. 163. 



"Ibid. 174. 



1 Llewellyn Jewitt, Ceramic Art (1878), i, 89. 



' Stow, Surv. of Land. bk. v, 240-1. 



wich in 1567, 'removed to London, and in 

 a petition to Queen Elizabeth asserted that 

 they were the first that brought in and exer- 

 cised the said science in this realm, and were 

 at great charges before they could find mate- 

 rials in this realm. They besought her, in 

 recompense of their great cost and charges, 

 that she would grant them house room in or 

 without the liberties of London by the water 

 side.' A similar petition was preferred to 

 the queen by one William Simpson, 3 who also 

 asked for the sole licence to import stone pots 

 from Cologne. Patents were granted in 1626 

 to Thomas Rous (or Ruis) and Abraham 

 Cullyn of London, 4 merchants, and in 1636 

 to David Ramsey, esq. for making stone pots, 

 but nothing is known of any use which they 

 made of the privileges granted to them. 



1 Lansd. MS. 108, fol. 60 ; Jewitt, op. cit. 

 1,90. 



4 Cal. S.P. Dm. 1625-6, p. 575. 



