Enid Marx once pondered ‘whether postage stamps are fine or industrial art. In my view the question rests on the quality of a design rather than its purpose. It is generally agreed, for example, that the work of Thomas Bewick is fine art, even when it is merely the engraving of a “trade card”.’ Marx was a textile designer, book illustrator, lino-cutter, wood-engraver, poster illustrator and, yes, postage-stamp designer (‘The calling card of a nation’, as she put it) and in all these things, the quality was unquestionable. Her unique, memorable designs were absorbed, unknowingly, by any number of people.

Her best-known work was the sturdy moquette fabric she designed for seats on London Underground in the 1930s. It was part of the vision of its director Frank Pick that nothing was too good for the passengers on public transport: ‘Where the interests of the public are concerned, no detail is too trivial,’ he observed. O si sic omnes. She also designed fabric for utility furniture after the war, for which she began by asking her daily help what she would like.

Burnham and Powell want to bring back stupid

Does Lucy Powell really think ‘knight’ is an obscure word?

It’s amazing how far Burnham has got by not being Keir Starmer

Marx was one of a golden generation, what Paul........

© The Spectator