In a recent blog post from the University of the Arts London, Assistant Archivist Morwenna Roche describes her experience of cataloguing the archive of AIM25 member, Camberwell College of Arts. Inaugurated in 1898 as the Camberwell School of Arts and Crafts, Camberwell delivered practical tuition in such skills as embroidery, cabinet design, stone carving, stencil cutting, painting and decorating, typography and drawing. All of these had their place in the popular Arts & Crafts movement, which emerged in Northern Europe and America from the 1880s, and was a focal point in London design circles as the school gathered momentum.

At time of writing, the most authoritative history of the college is Geoff Hassell’s 1990 book, The Camberwell School of Arts and Crafts: Its Students and Teachers, 1943-60. While Hassell’s work aided Morwenna in her journey towards understanding and organising the Camberwell materials, her diligent cataloguing of this collection represents a significant step forward in opening up the history and activities of the College to new researchers. While collection-level descriptions have been available on AIM25 for some time, Morwenna’s new catalogue can be browsed directly through the UAL Archives online pages.

The collection is stored at the Camberwell College of Arts Library and to book an appointment to view the material please email Camberwell Special Collections Librarian, Grace O’Driscoll g.odriscoll@arts.ac.uk.

For any other questions about Archives and Special Collections more generally, please email archive-enquiries@arts.ac.uk