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DARTINGTON COMMERCIAL ENTERPRISE - TEXTILES
Description: Records document the management of the Textile Department under Dartington Hall Ltd, including records relating to the expansion and re-organisation of the department into a building designed by Oswald Milne. The series includes business and manufacturing records for textile mills at Shinners Bridge, Dartington and East Mill, Fordingbridge, Hants, together with progress reports, policy and research programme records. There are also records of Dartington Hall Tweeds (with some samples). Series includes minutes of the Textile Mill Committee meetings. Administrative correspondence concerns staff and maintenance matters, plant and equipment, production, sales, and export reports. Records of managers of the Textile Department include those of founder Heremon (Toby) Fitzpatrick; Hiram Hague Winterbotham; Fred Todkill; and Gunnar Storvik. Books list staff and productivity and include existing hand coloured designs for floor rug patterns on graph paper. In 1932 a representative from I G Farben spent several months at Dartington working on dyeing methods, and five boxes of the series contain records and published material produced by I G Farbenindustrie Aktiengesellschaft. Material includes dyeing charts with samples of wool attached and detailed handwritten notes and observations, and colour handbooks.
The estate Laboratory gave help in finding and testing local plants suitable for producing vegetable dyes. Fitzpatrick kept in close contact with weaver Ethel Mairet of Ditchling, and Elizabeth Peacock, who designed and wove the banners in the Great Hall at Dartington. In 1930, further enquiries into dyeing were made with the laboratories of ICI at Manchester and Grangemouth. In 1932 Fitzpatrick obtained the help of the German company I G Farbenindustrie, to find the best aniline and vat dyes. I G Farben sent Herr Geisner who spent several months at Dartington teaching the technique of dyeing. Initially the Textile Department was installed in the courtyard but in 1931 relocated to a purpose-built mill designed by Oswald Milne, on the Dartington estate at Shinners Bridge powered by water from Bidwell Brook. It was hoped that full production would be achieved in 1933, but in fact output and revenue fell below expectation. Annual total was nearer 5,000 yards than 10,000. Also in this year, a Dartington sheep breeding experiment produced sufficient wool from two flocks of sheep (Welsh Mountain and Shetland Morit) to enable the Textile department to test and convert it to commercial use. Fitzpatrick was succeeded by Hiram Winterbotham who overhauled production methods and placed the mill upon a more secure business footing, rationalising the purchase of wool and increasing production. Trade consisted of tweeds for manufacturing and bespoke tailors and a few fashion houses, and of furnishing fabrics for department stores including Marks and Spencer. Winterbotham left Dartington in 1939, and his deputy Fred Todkill took over. By the end of the war the Textile Department was making small but consistent profits, and by 1951 had been reorganised over two sites using Fordingbridge as a carding and spinning plant, and Dartington as a weaving and finishing plant. Equipped with nine power looms, Dartington also remained the headquarters for administration and sales. Fred Todkill left Dartington in 1954 to be replaced by Gunnar Storvik in 1955. The Dartington Textile Department closed in the early 1980s. |
The Dartington Hall Trust is a registered charity no. 279756. Company no. 1485560
Registered Office: The Elmhirst Centre, Dartington Hall, Totnes, Devon TQ9 6EL United Kingdom.
Telephone 01803 847000; Fax 01803 847007;