Object Timeline

  • We acquired this object.

1939

  • Work on this object began.

2021

2025

  • You found it!

Textile, Aircraft

This is a Textile. It was designed by Marion Dorn Kauffer and made for (as the client) Old Bleach Linen Company, Ltd.. It is dated 1939. Its medium is screen-printed linen. It is a part of the department.


The first-class lounge on the Orcades II offered the familiar comfort of a living room while introducing new aesthetics. The decoration surrounded passengers with scenes of motion in the air and on land. Dorn’s furniture upholstery featured overlapping silhouettes of graceful birds in flight. Artist John Armstrong’s 14-foot-long mural of a herd of horses galloping through a fantasy landscape provided the backdrop.

It is credited The Whitworth, The University of Manchester.

Its dimensions are

H x W: 297 × 125 cm (9 ft. 8 15/16 in. × 49 3/16 in.) Roll (plexi tube / mount without rolled textile): 6 × 137 cm (2 3/8 × 53 15/16 in.)

This object was previously on display as a part of the exhibition Underground Modernist: E. McKnight Kauffer.

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<ref name=CH>{{cite web |url=https://www-6.collection.cooperhewitt.org/objects/2318805127/ |title=Textile, Aircraft |author=Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum |accessdate=20 March 2025 |publisher=Smithsonian Institution}}</ref>