Meet the Curator: I AM. WE ARE. LIBERTY

Head to the Fourth Floor of Liberty, and step inside the Liberty Archive as never before at our captivating exhibition: I AM. WE ARE. LIBERTY. Crafted to celebrate 150 years of Liberty, enter into an immersive journey into our DNA: design, nature, art.

Step by step, you’ll uncover the stories and secrets of Liberty’s history and explore the threads of our legacy, as you uncover the secrets of Liberty’s enchanting archive, brought to life like never before. Within the exhibition walls, Liberty’s unmistakable history of print, pattern and cultural connection combine in captivating, all-encompassing harmony.

Composed by renowned Italian art historian Ester Coen, an expert in avant-garde design, this unique experience offers a rare glimpse into 150 years of pioneering design. Walk though Liberty’s history: from the flora and fauna that suffuse our most iconic designs, to the people who designed, inspired and created their stories alongside our historic halls.

As the exhibition doors open in our Tudor home. Liberty spoke to Ester to find out more about this exceptional glimpse into Liberty’s history.

How did the exhibition come about: where did the journey begin?

Well, it all started a few years ago when Liberty invited me to try and understand if there was a relationship between the FUTURLIBERTY collection and the influence of Italian futurism. A few years later, I was invited again to see if I could help with Liberty’s 150th anniversary

Our starting point was in the archives, because not much of these are well known. We started looking into the archive and seeing that there was a continuity to how the design studio worked. The studio always looked into the archives to recreate fabrics, designs, patterns from what was already there: they all looked at the history.

What can we expect from the exhibition?

What we are aiming to show is the DNA of Liberty. D stands for design, N for nature, A for art. These are the main themes and subjects around which Liberty has created its own world and has also shown to the world a different way of living. Our voyage through the archives is divided into these moments.

You enter a magical world, full of imagination, full of colours, full of patterns, full of beautiful ideas. You are enchanted by the colour, by the ways in which so many designers have invented new patterns and new images. You see all the different moments - from the past to the present to the future - in a line of continuity, which is shown through the designs and through the archive.

What were some of the highlights you uncovered within the archives?

It’s difficult to give you one answer, because they are all so stunning. Each one is the image of the epoch in which they were made, and you feel that there’s a whole world of Liberty inside them.

One thing we found that is extremely interesting, are items from the Second World War years. In these, the fabrics, the designs and the patterns become completely different to pre-war eras.

There are still florals or abstracts, but very clearly black and white: this was because there was a shortage of colour printing, and they are extremely powerful. They are also connected to what were called “propaganda designs”. These were not propaganda in an obvious way, but they expressed a political idea, such as how England would win the war or how Churchill was a great leader.

How would you describe Liberty’s artistic or cultural influence through the decades?

Liberty has always been there. It is a brand which is very much in the popular imagination. Every decade’s designs reflect the period it is showing or describing. Through the decades you see how the mood changes, mostly through colours and through the way the florals or designs evolve.

For example, as I said, the war years were so dramatic that people didn’t feel like putting colours on prints. Even if there was a shortage of colour, they didn’t feel like putting something joyful on the surface. We found one design that was quite interesting - with cigarette butts in the design. Can you imagine selling a piece of material like that? But those were the years. Today, I don’t think anybody would buy them - well, I would! But not many people.

Was there anything that took you by surprise or was unexpected?

Most of the archival material was brand new to us, so yes - everything! It’s always a process of knowing, experiencing, trying to understand and learning.

How do you hope people feel when they’ve gone through the exhibition?

Personally, I hope they will be completely taken by this magical world - and I think they will be. People seem to be very enchanted by it. So, I hope that will be the message.

The I AM. WE ARE. LIBERTY exhibition runs in Liberty from 9th May - 25th July. Find the entrance in the East Gallery on the Fourth Floor. Admission is free.