Gertrude Jekyll�s scrap book of drawings

Scope and Content

The scrap book of drawings is held in the Lindley Library art collection, item reference 66817-1001. The scrap book was conserved in 2017 but remains fragile and readers are required to use surrogates in the form of digitised images of the volume and its contents. These may be accessed in the Research Room by appointment

A full catalogue of the scrap book is in progress. The following constitutes a summary description

An original label on the front cover of the volume, in Jekyll�s hand, reads, �Designs for Carving &c &c�. The volume appears to have been previously used as a scrap book of plants

Items are mostly pasted in, with some loose, and comprise:

Original art:

Designs depict or incorporate flowers, hips and leaves, a pick (tool), vases (from the Etruscan case at the British Museum), letters of the alphabet, a rope design, heraldic emblems, animals, birds and fish, geometrical patterns, frames or mounts, badges, architectural elevations including of a well, an artist at work shaded from the sun by a screen (page 10), decorative face or gargoyle (page 13), bow and arrow, Celtic style designs, decorated donkeys, silhouette of bat (page 16), angels and mythical creatures (page 18), a ship, a mounted knight spearing a dragon (page 19), household furniture and soft furnishings, patterns specifically for cloth work and jewellery, church furniture, tablewear (teapot, tankard), lights and light fittings, a knife, fire places and hearths, a chest or trunk, a bathroom (page 100), a weather vane, a double-page spread of the interior of Berkeley Castle (pages 102-103), tavern sign for The Jolly Farmer (page 105), simple design incorporating Jekyll�s initials and dates �GJ 48 : 87� (page 123), a banner that reads �Busbridge School�, Jun 1902 (page 133), a pattern for an apron (page 135), designs for buttons, designs incorporating the words �Home and Garden� (page 137), sandals, a garden seat (page 142), floor plan of a cottage (page 147), chimneypiece in the sitting room at Munstead Wood (page 147), and a Sussex bullock shoe (page 148)

Media include pencil, ink, watercolour

Designs are on tracing paper, squared graph paper, blank and coloured paper

Collected printed designs including coats of arms and insignia, a section of a frieze (page 11), decorative header of a page of a publication (page 27), printed garden plan of unidentified garden (page 115), and cuttings from a framer�s catalogue (page 127)

Photographs of frames (pages 110, 137)

Jekyll�s annotations through the scrap book include:

�22nd Surrey� (page 3)

�Tennyson � Illustrated by Routh and other PRs, pub about 1856?� (page 5)

�Badge for Volunteers� (page 7)

�Turkish� (page 7)

�Captn Gardner� (page 9)

�Artillery� (page 11)

�Edward VI� (page 12)

�Brougham[?]� (page 13)

�Well, Crazies Hill� (page 13)

�Picture of Birth of the Virgin. Colour of dresses of the two women in the foreground [�]� (page 14)

�Decorated donkey� (page 15)

�Cranleigh Rectory!� (page 15)

�Elizabethan� (page 17)

�Lo Brougham� (page 19)

�Bronze chain Louvre� (page 20)

�Eva Micklam 1870� (page 20)

�Ornament in distemper on gold ground above the cornice �Palazzo Borghese by Bolognese [�]� (page 29)

�Berkeley April 1869� (page 32)

�Arms of Jekyll� (page 34)

�Velvet tassel from recollection of an Italian drawing� (page 35)

�Carved oak panel from pulpit in Wargrave Church� (page 36)

�Design for gold necklace. Flower, leaf and fruit of myrtle� (page 37)

�Indian slippers� (page 45)

�Arms of Borgia family� (page 56)

�Audley End � from recollection� (page 59)

�Stitching on carters frocks� (pages 62-63)

�Macrame curtain holder� (page 69)

�Russian embroidery� (page 71)

�Necklace made of Egyptian mummy beads� (page 75)

�Berkeley� (page 77)

�From the Vatican� (page 79)

�From an old book of maps� (page 82)

�Prussian wall tile� (page 86)

�Cornice of Chippendale table, Barrington Park� (page 86)

�Marble pavement of Duomo, Milan, drawn by Herbert [Herbert Jekyll]� (page 87)

�Tile pattern� (page 88)

�Wall tile from Cairo, S.K. Museum� (page 89)

�Red silk, quilted� (page 93)

�Wallpaper, GJ, Novr 29th 75� (page 94) (this item replaced with copy of the original)

�Venetian glass, engraved, frame of carved wood gilt. Price �5 each, including packing� (page 96)

�Arms of Jekyll of Essex and Middlesex, 29 Dec 1881, College of Arms� (page 113)

�Doors, Field Place� (page 130)

�GJ March 11 1890� (page 132)

�West door, Holy Trinity, Colchester� (page 134)

�Old West Surrey [�] 1904� (page 139)

�Pattern for border of table cover adapted from Italian bed. Decr 1870. GJ� (page 146)

�Cover[?] to lead weight, March 1866� (page 159)

�Frames for shell pictures. Octagonal. July 1908� (page 162)

On the reverse of a watercolour design of animals on page 6 is a note to �My dear Gug� from her brother Walter Jekyll, written from Naples, 3 Apr 1872

The volume measures 44.7 (h) x 29.0 (w) cm