The Arts and Crafts Movement developed as a reaction against the products and social impact of industrialised manufacturing. The Great Exhibition of 1851 attracted about 6 million people to its displays of Raw Materials, Machinery and Invention, Manufacture, and Sculpture and Plastic Arts, but it was obvious that many of the new manufactured goods were ugly or shoddy compared to the craft-made products of the past.

One of the most important figures in the movement was the poet, craftsman and socialist, William Morris (1834-96), who wanted to revive artistic craftsmanship. In 1861 he founded Morris & Co., a cooperative of ‘Fine Art Workmen’, to produce wallpapers, furniture and stained glass. Around the same time, musicians began to develop the historical performance movement, which focused on early music played on hand-made, historically appropriate instruments. This was a counter-reaction to the growth in size and loudness of the modern orchestra and its technologically driven, mass-produced instruments.

The Movement produced some fine buildings (mostly country houses), furniture, glass and textiles and, by example, raised the standards of British design and craftsmanship. However the love and care lavished on craft-made products made them costly, and only wealthy clients could afford them. Morris and his fellow enthusiasts could not turn back the clock, and the future lay with better design of mass-produced objects.