Indeed a very great privilege for the request to oversee the well being and active curation of what is probably the largest William Morris carpet in extent. The management of a carpet of an approx 75 sq. mt which weighs in at an excess of 600 kilos is a considerable logistical undertaking requiring a team eight to just move it to another location.
The carpet was originally woven at William Morris & Co's Mersham Abbey workshop in the second half of the 1880s for the Wyndham family at Clouds House designed by Philip Webb who also did the Red House for William Morris himself. In the 1920s the Wyndham family had a house dispersal sale and the present owners grandfather ( a contemporary and friend of Morris ) purchased the carpet for the Gloucestershire house where it has remained ever since.
Having proposed that the carpet be fully conserved in three phases thus far have achieved the first stage in 2021 and 2022 with a complete washing offsite and conservation. Presentaly in 2023 additional conservation and the replacement of some old restorationr is underway toward the carpet being returned to Gloucestershire in the Autumn.
Shortly to open 21 July 2026, we are currently engaging in the working up and provisions of carpet services to the visitor centre at this famous house on the outskirts of London. Termed 'House of Secrets', the house also known as Trent Park House, played an important role in WWII along with Bletchley Park in wartime covert surveillance. It hosted senior German officer prisoners of war, who were eavesdropped upon whilst enjoying the comparative freedoms of the gardens and grounds, with the odd whiskey to get tongues wagging...
Following a discovery of a pair of 1920s Donegal kneeler runners at the local town parish church of St. Laurences in September 2024 work was commissioned to rejuvenate the carpet and brassware on the steps leading leading from the Nave to the Chancel. The task was tricky as the brassware and fittings were all in a poor state and the carpet was starting to unravel and therefore needed binding not to mention fixings into marble steps !. The result was splendid and fully deserving of the not inconsiderable effort for what might otherwise have appeared a straightforward task.
To our amazement apparently the Natural History Museum offer a commercial pest control service which includes an ‘ Anoxic ‘ treatment. https://www.nhm.ac.uk/our-science/services/facilities/quarantine.html Also reliable products for domestic use may be purchased from the company Histrionics https://historyonics.com/ whose principal we understand comes from an academic science background. Also there is a new company ANOXART who specialise in anoxic insect irradiation whose apararatus for their argon method is pictured here. Also as per in a previous blog we offer free freezing treatment for my own customers https://www.orient-rug.com/blogs/news/clinical-moth-treatment-a-free-service-to-customerts
