Anna Maria Garthwaite: Successful Silk Designer

Anna Maria Garthwaite was a silk designer in 18th century England. A silk designers’ purpose was to create designs that showed weavers what colours and decoration they should weave on their loom. Anna specialised in designs representing flowers and plants which were created on ruled paper in watercolour and pencil. Many women in the 18th century worked in the silk trade but it is thought that there were not many British women silk designers. This is because Garthwaite’s designs are the only work by a British woman designer that survives from the period. Another known 18th century British female silk designer was Phoebe Wright but I will not be discussing Wright here and instead will be exploring Anna’s life and work.

Anna was born in 1688 in Grantham in Lincolnshire to a vicar named Ephrain and his wife Rejoyce. Not much is known about her early life except that she made a type of artwork called a papercut design when she was in her late teens. They were often made on paper or other materials like velum and were created using a knife or scissors to cut shapes with. Anna’s design shows a large house surrounded by trees with people working in it. It is thought to be set in Lincolnshire as it features a windmill which was a common sight there.

Anna’s papercut design is unusual for the time. Many papercut designs showed white shapes on a dark background. Anna’s design features dark shapes on a light background which were less common for papercut designs. Anna later used the same composition in some of her silk designs.

Anna lived with her father until his death in 1719 when she moved to live near or with her sister and brother-in-law in Yorkshire. While in Yorkshire Anna started creating silk designs which were fairly simple in contrast to the ones she later made. Anna also had catalogues of silk patterns that she studied and were possibly a way for her to learn how to design silk. Anna never undertook a formal apprenticeship to train to be a silk designer. However, she may have done an informal one with a silk designer. Nonetheless, there are no letters or documents that confirm this, so we do not fully know how Anna learnt to design silk.

In 1728 Anna moved with her sister Mary to Spitalfields where they brought a house after Mary’s husband’s death. Spitalfields in the 1700s, was a major centre for the Silk Trade so Anna’s move there may have been deliberate. Spitalfields had become this because in the late 1600s many French Protestants known as Huguenots fled to neighbouring countries like England after the Revocation of the Edict of Nantes. The Edict of Nantes had been introduced into France by King Henri 4th in 1598 and gave civil equality to both Protestants and Catholics. It also included rules that were intended to create a peaceful coexistence between Protestants and Catholics. It did however set restrictions on Protestant worship. Louis XIV revoked the Edict of Nantes in the late 1600s and replaced it with Edict of Fontainebleau. This banned Protestant worship and stated that their worship places should be destroyed. Some Huguenots who came to London, had experience and knowledge of silk and worked in London with it. Spitalfields before their arrival, had already been a big producer of silk but became even more productive with the addition Huguenot Silk Workers.

In London there was also the Chelsea Physic Garden which was likely an important place for Anna to develop her skill in creating realistic looking plants for her designs. This is because she could have visited it to study plants and flowers there. Anna probably got access to the garden through her brother-in-law Vincent Bacon. Bacon was an apothecary who lived in Spitalfields and as a result had access to the garden.

In the 1740s Anna changed her artistic style. In the 1730s Anna’s designs had involved placing light-coloured flowers on a dark background. In the 1740s she instead used a cream background and placed multi-coloured flowers and plants in it. The plants also had a realism in them which had been lacking in her previous designs.

In the 1740s Anna’s designs became very popular in both Britain and North America and parts of Scandinavia. For example, there is a portrait of an American woman named Anna Shippen Willing wearing a silk dress with a design by Anna from 1743.

Anna’s output declined in the 1750s. This could have possibly been to changes in fashion which may have meant her designs were no longer in demand. Anna is thought to have died in the 1760s and her estate, despite her success, was fairly modest.

List of Sources Used

• Anna Maria Garthwaite, Anna Maria Garthwaite | Textile Designer | Blue Plaques | English Heritage (Website Article).
• Anishanlin, Zara, 2016, New Haven University Press, (Book).
• At Anna Maria Garthwaite’s House, Spitalfields’s Life Blog, 5 September 2025, At Anna Maria Garthwaite’s House | Spitalfields Life, (Blog Post).
• Murray Caroline, Anna Maria Garthwaite, Professor Hedgehog’s Journal, 4 November 2020, Anna Maria Garthwaite | Professor Hedgehog’s Journal. (Blog Post).
• The Period of the Revocation of the Edict of Nantes (1661-1700) Musée Protesant, The period of the Revocation of the Edict of Nantes (1661-1700) – Musée protestant (Website Article).