A View of the Roses: Vanessa Bell’s Bedroom at Charleston
Some of the most prolific thinkers, writers and artists of the 20th-century slept under the roof of Charleston Farmhouse in Sussex, England. T.S Eliot, E.M Forster and Virginia and Leonard Woolf were just a few of the eminent guests to stop by. There were also some very forward-thinking, rather free-wheeling family dynamics at play here.
Vanessa Bell, Virginia’s sister, fellow Bloomsbury Group member, and artist, was the matriarch at Charleston. She moved into the house with her partner Duncan Grant, Grant’s lover David Garnett, and her two small sons Julian and Quintin (fathered by her husband Clive Bell) in 1916. On Christmas Day in 1918, Vanessa gave birth to a girl, Angelica, who although brought up believing her father was Clive Bell, was, in fact, the biological daughter of Duncan Grant - a truth she didn’t discover until she was eighteen. Confused yet? Me too. Nevertheless, Charleston was the family home for the Bells, Grants and their respective lovers for the next sixty-four years.Â
Upon their arrival, Vanessa, along with her partner Duncan and other Bloomsbury Group artist, Roger Fry, set about transforming the property. Their decorative style was ‘full of sensuous beauty’ [1]. Influences from French Post-Impressionist art and Mediterranean architecture and design can be seen throughout the house, such as in the warm colours and shapes of the paintings, ceramics and Italian-style frescoes on the walls. The bedrooms and the furniture within them were approached with particular care. Although all akin in their artistic style, each bedroom included unique and thoughtful touches to provide a special and accommodating space for the person dwelling there. The bedroom allocated to Vanessa Bell’s husband Clive Bell (who became a permanent resident there in 1939), for example, was fitted out with carpet from his Gordon Square flat and included a library chair upholstered in a fabric designed by Vanessa, which he enjoyed to sit and read in.
Vanessa’s own bedroom was adapted from a larder on the ground floor in 1939. Now, in a room of her own, from the newly installed French windows, she had a view of the garden, where she could see and smell the roses: ‘I am sitting at my open bedroom window … it opens down to the ground and I look out on to the lawn … The monthly roses are in bloom. It’s a hot summer evening … the pinks are making the whole place smell …’[2] The room, as we can still see today, is adorned with artwork by Bell and Grant. By the door, a beautiful hand-painted wardrobe sits, done by Bell in 1917, with distinctive circle motifs and a colour palette of red, purple, pink, pale blue and yellow. The room also has a bath and sink, complete with murals. Â
Vanessa has been undeniably overshadowed by her literary sister Virginia over the years, but the preservation of her home at Charleston has ensured her voice and work lives on. As one critic put it: ‘... Bell’s paintings and home decorations are anything but silent; they shout and scream in a cacophony of colour and shape, rude lines and sudden gentle shading.’ [3] They refuse to be ignored. We should not forget also her ground-breaking feminist project ‘The Famous Women Dinner Service’, depicting fifty revolutionary women throughout history, that she made with Grant from 1932-34 and went on public show for the first time last year. [4]
Like her sister Virginia so vehemently believed, that ‘a room of one’s own’ was a vital catalyst for independence and creative work, so too did Vanessa Bell and Duncan Grant highlight the importance of one’s own space for privacy, work and rest. Through their thoughtful designs, ceramics and paintings, Bell and Grant provided a haven for their guests and inhabitants in each of their bedrooms. It’s no surprise then that the stories, artworks, ideas and relationships(!) that formed in these rooms were significant ones; going so far as to shake and alter the stuffy culture and status quo of early 20th-century Britain.
Notes
[1] https://www.charleston.org.uk/charleston-bloomsbury-history/
[2] https://www.charleston.org.uk/charleston-room-by-room/
[3] https://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/2017/jan/27/design-and-desires-how-vanessa-bell-put-the-bloom-in-bloomsbury
[4] Set of feminist dinner plates: https://news.artnet.com/exhibitions/vanessa-bell-duncan-grant-famous-women-dinner-service-1254239






