Dresser and Japan

In 1854, after 200 years of strictly enforced isolation, Japan opened its borders to foreigners. Japanese art began to trickle out to the West, where it influenced European and American artists. The first major impact on a wider public was at the 1862 London International Exhibition. Here, Sir Rutherford Alcock, the British Minister at the Japanese Court, organised a display of Japanese art works. Dresser made drawings of items from thecollection. He also bought a number of pieces, as did Arthur Lasenby Liberty, founder of the Regent Street store in London.

In 1876-7 Dresser visited Japan. As an official representative of the South Kensington Museum, the Japanese Government invited him to tour the country and advise on the future of their art manufactures. He visited 'sixty–eight potteries and some scores of manufacturers'. He bought thousands of Japanese art objects for Tiffany & Co in New York and for Londos, the wholesale oriental merchant in London of which he was art director. On his return hewrote Japan: Its Architecture, Art and Art Manufactures (1882), an early and well–illustrated account of Japan and Japanese craft techniques.

On his return from Japan in 1877 Dresser's perceptions changed. From being principally an 'ornamentist', he virtually rejected ornament. Japan taught him that form was enough to entertain and please the eye and that ornament can distract from, rather than enhance, form.

This new design direction was suited to machine production. Dresser came to understand that even the humblest objects need to be designed. He wrote in his book on Japan in 1881: 'It is important to remember that a Japanese potter, lacquer-worker, or other handicraftsman may as famous as a Landseer or a Turner, and that works bearing his signature will be as much sought after ... as those of any of our "great masters" are'.

In 1878 silversmiths Hukin & Heath registered the first of Dresser's radical post–Japan designs. He designed similarly innovative shapes for a number of manufacturers, including the Linthorpe Art Pottery, James Dixon & Son and Benham & Froud. These designs were sold through the Art Furnishers' Alliance, a store stocked and financed by his clients.