# Dictionary of National Biography, 1912 supplement/Day, Lewis Foreman

​DAY, LEWIS FOREMAN (1845–1910), decorative artist, born at Peckham Rye on 29 Jan. 1845, was son of Samuel Hulme Day, wine merchant in the City of London, of an old Quaker family of Essex, which claimed descent from John Day (1522–1584) [q. v.], the Elizabethan printer. His mother was Mary Ann Lewis. After attending a school in France, he entered Merchant Taylors' School in January 1858, and on leaving continued his education in Germany for eighteen months. He then after a short time as a clerk went at the age of twenty into the works of Lavers & Barraud, glass painters and designers. Thence he moved to the workshops of Clayton & Bell, makers of stained glass, and there he remained for two years, his principal work being to design the cartoons. In 1870 he worked for Heaton, Butler & Bayne on the decoration of Eaton Hall, Cheshire, and in the same year he started for himself in London. He took from his early training special interest in stained glass, gradually acquiring a wide reputation as a designer for textiles, pottery, carpets, wall-papers, and many other branches of manufacture. His designs were always carefully adapted to the material in which they were to be carried out, and to the processes of manufacture which had to be employed. He belonged to the same school of art-craftsmen as William Morris and Walter Crane, and his influence on contemporary ornament, if not so fully recognised as that of those two artists, was considerable. Many of the best-known designers of his day were taught by him.
One of the first promoters of the Arts and Crafts Society and a founder of the Art Workers Guild, of which he was at one time master, Day was from 1897 to his death almost continuously a member of the council of the Royal Society of Arts, before which society he delivered four courses of Cantor lectures. To the government department, originally that of science and art, and afterwards the board of education, he rendered important and well-appreciated service. From 1890 onwards he examined in painting and ornament, and later was, in addition, associated with William Morris, Walter Crane, and other decorative artists, in examining works sent in by schools of art for national competition. Shortly before 1900 he gave courses of lectures on ornamental art at the Royal College of Art at South Kensington, and he also inspected and reported on provincial schools of art where ornamental work was studied and practised.
When the Victoria and Albert Museum was established in its new building (1909) he was a member of the committee appointed to report upon the arrangement of the collections, and he greatly influenced the scheme which was eventually adopted.
A course of Cantor lectures at the Royal Society of Arts in 1886 on 'Ornamental Design' was followed by the publication of many important volumes on ornament and decoration. On his Cantor lectures were founded : 'Anatomy of Pattern' (1887) and 'The Planning of Ornament' (1887). The work which he esteemed his best was 'Windows' (1897; 3rd edit. 1909), the fruit of an exhaustive study of continental stained glass pursued in holiday tours of twenty years. He was also author of 'Instances of Accessory Art' (fol. 1880), 'Every Day Art' (1882; 2nd edit. 1894; Dutch trans. 1886); 'Alphabets Old and New' (1898; 3rd enlarged edit. 1910); (with Mary Buckle) 'Art in Needlework' (1900; 3rd edit. 1908); 'Lettering in Ornament' (1902); 'Pattern Design' (1903); the South Kensington handbook on 'Stained Glass' (1903); 'Ornament and its Application' (1904); 'Enamelling' (1907); and 'Nature and Ornament' (2 vols. 1908-9). Day died at his house, 15 Taviton Street, W.C., on 18 April 1910, and was buried in Highgate cemetery. He married Ruth Emma Morrish in 1873, and had one daughter, Ruth.
[Personal knowledge; information from Mrs. Day; Merchant Taylors' School Reg. ii. 330; Manchester Guardian and Glasgow Herald, 19 April 1910; Journal Soc. of Arte, lviii. 660.]
H. T. W.