Although Henry Moore is a very recognisable figure in modern sculpture, few people realise that at the close of the Second World War he also made a large number of textile designs and fabrics. In the early 1940s at the instigation of Zika Ascher, a Czech manufacturer who came to Britain as an exile in 1939, he filled four sketchbooks with ideas for this purpose. Between 1944 and 1947, Ascher commissioned several leading artists including Moore, Henri Matisse, Ivon Hitchens and Jean Cocteau, to produce designs for silk squares which were intended to liven up the post-war wardrobe. In line with his socialist approach to integrating art with daily life, Moore used bold, bright colours to create ideas for the squares, as well as for dress and upholstery fabrics. More than twenty of his designs were eventually used by Ascher and printed on a variety of fabrics including silk, parachute nylon, cotton and rayon, sometimes in as many as twenty different colourways. 

In 1953, as part of the Painting Into Textiles exhibition at the Institute of Contemporary Art, London, Moore’s work also came to the attention of Tom Mellor, director of David Whitehead Fabrics, and subsequently two of his designs were produced by the company. 

This exhibition brings together many of these fabrics, together with four large-scale wall panels which went into production at a later date. Also on display are many of Moore’s original drawings, some of which only came to light as recently as 2006, as well as a small selection of related sculpture and archive material. 

In Hoglands, Moore’s home, his Zigzag design (TEX 23), printed by David Whitehead, was made up into bedspreads and curtains and two Ascher fabrics, Treble Clef and Saftey Pins (TEX 12) and Heads (TEX 9), were also used as curtain material. Reproductions of the Ascher fabrics can be seen on display in Hoglands at Perry Green during the visitor season.