'I Was Meant to Be A Painter' Says Marthe Armitage

Famous for her hand printed wallpaper, she turns her hand towards an art exhibition

Chiswick artist Marthe Armitage is best known for her hand-printed wallpapers which are painstakingly crafted at her studio at Strand on the Green.

Marthe Armitage has been designing and printing wallpapers since the 1960s. Some of her designs have also been produced on textiles. But Marthe says that she was originally intending to be an artist.

Marthe studied painting at Chelsea School of Art in the 1940s. She married an architect and they brought up their children at Strand on the Green. She designed her first wallpaper for her own home- it was based on images of angelica, a plant which grows wild beside the river there.

She says; "I was meant to be a painter but marriage and babies happened. When you are painting you have to cut off from everybody, you have to be absent."

Pic- Anna Kunst

She uses her skill at lino-cutting to prepare the designs and print them onto lining paper on the floor, unti lshe acquired an old cast iron offset lithographic proofing press. These days she works with her daughter, Joanna Broadhurst, printing by hand to order. Marthe prefers to print in muted colours as she thinks wallpapers should be in the background.

Now turning towards an exhibition and sale of prints and paintings which will be in aid of Christ Church W4, she comments: "It is all a question of looking. You see something and you think it 'right'. All my life I have had ideas. I realise that if you don't do anything about your ideas, the less they will come. I realise now, that there are ideas absolutely everywhere."

Recently her designs were used at West Middlesex Hospital to produce a calming environment in some units, including cardiac.

"My inspiration has always been the mystery of pattern, which is as basic to sight as music is to hearing. The best place to see pattern is on a wall. Plants lend themselves so easily to repeat pattern and plant designs came first. Later, after looking at toile de jouy fabrics the thought came of drawing imaginary worlds ", says Marthe. "All my information comes from drawing and all my ideas and inspiration from looking at God's work".

Marthe designed the glass doors for Christ Church in 2002.

She is donating her works of art to the church to raise funds for the restoration of St Alban's.

Exhibition Times: at Christ Church, Turnham Green-

Friday, July 13th ( 1.30-3.30; and 7.30 to 9pm)

Saturday 14th July (12-4pm)

Sunday 15th July (1-3 pm)

Monday 16th July ( 2-4pm)

July 5, 2018