Help to conserve & reinstate the Tapestries.

Dr Kathy Haslam FSA in front of the tapestry showing Samson and the Philistines

One of the Manor’s most important spaces is the Tapestry Room, with its 17th-century Dutch tapestries, a rare survival of its Manor’s pre-Morris interiors. Originally a bedroom, the Tapestry Room acquired an added significance when William Morris and Dante Gabriel Rossetti took on the joint tenancy of Kelmscott Manor in 1871.

Morris loved these rare wall-hangings mellowed by age, declaring that they gave the Tapestry Room ‘an air of romance which nothing else would quite do’. He gravitated there, using it as both workspace and sitting room. It was tapestries such as these that inspired him to learn the technique himself and set about reinventing it.

We have raised 86% of the £306,000 needed to complete the Conservation and reinstatement of the Tapestry Room. Help us raise the rest!

We are grateful to the National Lottery Heritage Fund, the Historic Houses Foundation, The Company of Mercers, The Blavatnik Family Foundation, The L.G. Harris Trust and generous donations of Benefactors, Companions and Supporters of Kelmscott Manor for the £266,000 (86% of project cost) raised so far. We need your help to raise the £40,000 needed to complete the project to conserve the tapestries in sequence and re-hang them as they were in Morris’s time. 

You Can Support Us in These Ways

Kelmscott Manor Companion

Donate £500 and it will be recorded in perpetuity in a special ‘Commemorative Companion’ book.

Kelmscott Manor Benefactor

Make a donation of £5,000 and it will be recorded on a specially commissioned plaque as a ‘Kelmscott Manor Benefactor’.

If you would like to become a Companion of Kelmscott Manor or a Benefactor, please download our donation form.

Give What You Can

Donate any amount to us today through the drop-down menu below.

  • Tapestry Appeal

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    Thank you for choosing to donate to Kelmscott Manor, part of the Society of Antiquaries of London (registered charity no. 207237). Your donation will go toward our ‘Tapestry Campaign’ campaign and be used to support this charitable objective.
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    Gift aid: costs you nothing, helps us keep going When you tick the gift aid box, we will receive an extra 25% on top of your donation, and it doesn’t cost you a penny. When you choose to ‘Gift Aid’ your donation, the Government gives us 25% extra (25p for each £1 you donated). By choosing to ‘Gift Aid’ your donation, you are confirming that you have paid or will pay an amount of Income Tax and/or Capital Gains Tax for the current tax year (6 April to 5 April) that is at least equal to the amount of tax that the Society of Antiquaries of London (and/or Kelmscott Manor) and other charities will reclaim on your gifts for the current tax year (Council Tax and VAT do not count). Please notify the Society if you want to cancel this declaration, change your name or home address, or no longer pay sufficient tax on your income and/or capital gains. If you pay Income Tax at the higher or additional rate and want to receive the additional tax relief due to you, you must include all your Gift Aid donations on your Self Assessment tax return or ask HM Revenue and Customs to adjust your tax code.
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