Marthe Armitage is a British

wallpaper Wallpaper is a material used in interior decoration to decorate the interior walls of domestic and public buildings. It is usually sold in rolls and is applied onto a wall using wallpaper paste. Wallpapers can come plain as "lining paper" (so t ...

designer whose work is characterized by unique hand-drawn designs that are hand printed from lino blocks, varying in size. She makes designs for wallpapers, and

curtain A curtain is a piece of cloth or other material intended to block or obscure light, air drafts, or (in the case of a shower curtain), water. A curtain is also the movable screen or drape in a theatre that separates the stage from the auditorium ...

Early life

After World War II, Armitage studied at the

Chelsea School of Art Chelsea College of Arts is a constituent college of the University of the Arts London based in London, United Kingdom, and is a leading British art and design institution with an international reputation. It offers further and higher educat ...

, where she trained to be a painter.

Career

In the 1950s, after she was married and had children, Armitage started designing and making lino-cut wallpaper. Over time, she became known for her hand-drawn and hand-printed designs. After sketching the design, she uses hand-cut lino blocks and a century-old offset lithographic printing press to create custom-printed rolls of wallpaper. She works in a studio in her garage, where she keeps her printing press. Her daughter, Joanna Broadhurst, works as her assistant. In 1993 she was elected as Master of the

Art Workers' Guild The Art Workers' Guild is an organisation established in 1884 by a group of British painters, sculptors, architects, and designers associated with the ideas of William Morris and the Arts and Crafts movement. The guild promoted the 'unity of a ...

. In 2004, the historic wallpaper design company Hamilton Weston agreed to represent her work. Sigmar London also sell her work. She designed a wallpaper she entitled "Alphabet" for ''

The Woman in Black ''The Woman in Black'' is a 1983 gothic horror novel by English writer Susan Hill. The plot concerns a mysterious spectre that haunts a small English town. A television film based on the story, also called '' The Woman in Black'', was produced ...

,'' which was created for the film which is based on

Susan Hill Dame Susan Hill, Lady Wells, (born 5 February 1942) is an English author of fiction and non-fiction works. Her novels include ''The Woman in Black'', '' The Mist in the Mirror'', and ''I'm the King of the Castle'', for which she received th ...

’s ghost story. Armitage's designs cover the nursery, which is haunted, with

automata An automaton (; plural: automata or automatons) is a relatively self-operating machine, or control mechanism designed to automatically follow a sequence of operations, or respond to predetermined instructions.Automaton – Definition and More ...

. The nursery is featured in the scenes where Daniel Radcliffe's character faces off with the titular character. As of 2020, Armitage was also producing wallpapers through digital processes. In 2018 she was commissioned to create digitally printed wallpaper on vinyl, for the

West Middlesex University Hospital West Middlesex University Hospital (WMUH) is an acute NHS hospital in Isleworth, West London, operated by Chelsea and Westminster Hospital NHS Foundation Trust. It is a teaching hospital of Imperial College School of Medicine and a designated ac ...

Isleworth Isleworth ( ) is a town located within the London Borough of Hounslow in West London, England. It lies immediately east of the town of Hounslow and west of the River Thames and its tributary the River Crane, London, River Crane. Isleworth's or ...

West London West London is the western part of London, England, north of the River Thames, west of the City of London, and extending to the Greater London boundary. The term is used to differentiate the area from the other parts of London: North London ...

Notes and references

{{DEFAULTSORT:Armitage, Marthe Living people Alumni of Chelsea College of Arts British designers British women artists Year of birth missing (living people) Masters of the Art Worker's Guild