AN ARCHIVE OF DESIGN PROOFS FOR PRINTED TEXTILES BY THE ENGRAVING FIRM LOCKETT, CROSSLAND & Co. OF STRANGEWAYS WORKS, MANCHESTER. Archives such as this appear very rarely on the market. Until about twenty years ago this collection remained in situ at Lockett & Crossland's mill. Although only one of the pattern books, Mill Eccentric Covers 1884 (lot 209), bears the stamp of Lockett, Crossland & Co. the pattern books are with one exception similar in form - the patterns are inserted chronologically by subject. Many of the large patterns still have manuscript labels naming the mercer. The small patterns like shirtings are mounted in numbered pattern books with no annotations except the date. Most are printed on glazed cotton with the tablecovers sometimes on pieces of materials stuck together.
Only a very few of the patterns such as the triangular bandages for Burroughs Wellcome and others (lot 162) give the retailers name. The handkerchief of the Manchester College of Technology bears the firm's own initials. With the trademarks things are different, the "faceplates" printed on bolt ends record many famous names in the Indian cotton trade. The paper sample in lot 162 for A.V.Roe & Co. is a link with Manchester's one aeroplane company.
The one exception is the earliest pattern book of all, lot 202, covering the years 1849-51, where the samples are listed customer by customer for each year. This may be a pattern book by Joseph Lockett, the firm's founder "The greatest engraver in Manchester".
The collection reflects the dominance of Manchester cottons in the world market. It includes Russian tablecloths, Bulgarian drapes and a Peruvian handkerchief, faceplates for India and China, handkerchiefs inscribed in Spanish and other handkerchiefs woven similar to those with Swiss maps and German scenes.
A pattern book, mainly fourteen designs per page including sailboats, dragons and turtles, wasps and butterflies, garden and farming tools--34in x 15in x 4½in, circa 1885; another with one sample per page including designs for handkerchiefs; seven others mainly six samples per page, and a quantity of loose leaves, (some fragile and disbound)(a lot)
Details
A pattern book, mainly fourteen designs per page including sailboats, dragons and turtles, wasps and butterflies, garden and farming tools--34in x 15in x 4½in, circa 1885; another with one sample per page including designs for handkerchiefs; seven others mainly six samples per page, and a quantity of loose leaves, (some fragile and disbound)(a lot)