Design by A.W.N. Pugin. Design details for screen for St Giles, Cheadle; a chalice and paten set in foliage

Design by A.W.N. Pugin. Design details for screen for St Giles, Cheadle; a chalice and paten set in foliage

Purchased with support from Art Fund, The Rick Mather David Scrase Foundation, The Friends of the National Libraries and The Murray Family. With additional support from Bonhams

This drawing is from a collection of 703 designs acquired by the museum in 2023 from the business archive of Birmingham metalworker, John Hardman & Co. The drawings were sent to John Hardman Jr by the pioneering architect of the nineteenth-century Gothic Revival, A. W. N. Pugin, during the course of their collaboration from 1838 until Pugin's death in September 1852.

The drawings show the key role Hardman played in turning Pugin's Gothic dream into an architectural reality. They include Pugin's designs for silver, brass, iron and stained glass fixtures and furnishings that were made in Hardman's Birmingham factories for major projects such as the Palace of Westminster, St George's Church (from 1852, Cathedral), Southwark, and Alton Towers, home of Pugin's most loyal patron, John Talbot, 16th Earl of Shrewsbury. Metalwork designs for Pugin's Medieval Court at Great Exhibition of 1851 are also among the drawings as well as more personal commissions such as brass candlesticks and dining silver for Pugin's own house, the Grange, in Ramsgate and jewellery for family and friends.

Hardman was among a small circle of manufacturers on whom Pugin relied that included master builder, George Myers, for building, stonework and woodwork, John Gregory Crace for furniture and textiles and Herbert Minton for ceramics. Together they had a considerable impact on nineteenth-century art and design, most notably at the Great Exhibition where Pugin's 'Medieval Court' proved hugely popular and provided some of the first acquisitions by the South Kensington Museum (now V&A).

The Hardman drawings are working drawings rather than works of art. Many have rough edges and are covered in dirt from Hardman's factory. Complex designs are shown in exquisite detail; others are basic outlines. Pugin wrote technical instructions on some but left Hardman to interpret others.

The V&A purchased the drawings in 2023 with support from Art Fund, the Rick Mather David Scrase Foundation, the Friends of the National Libraries and the Murray Family, with further support from Bonhams.

Of all the collaborators with whom Pugin worked, John Hardman Jr was his closest friend and confidant. John Hardman Jr founded his metalworking company in Birmingham in 1838, soon after meeting Pugin. Pugin's influence on his life and career was enormous. Pugin designed his showroom in Great Charles Street and urged Hardman to expand his business in 1844 to include stained glass production. Their relationship was built on personal friendship, professional collaboration and shared devotion to the Catholic faith.

Pugin had converted to Catholicism in 1835, only six years after the Catholic Relief Act lifted legal restrictions on Catholics in public life. He proclaimed that 'the Roman Catholic Church is the only true one ... in which the grand and sublime style of architecture can ever be restored'. Pugin and Hardman's collaboration stimulated a demand for metalwork, textiles and stained glass that served both Catholic and Anglican churches. Many of the drawings are for commissions for churches that Hardman then adapted as commercial stock.

Pugin's death at the age of 40 enables us to date all his designs for Hardman to between 1838 and 1852. Pugin, a tireless letter writer, sent his drawings and issued instructions to Hardman by post. His communication style could be extremely robust but was also warm. Pugin's letters greeted most manufacturers and clients as 'Dear Sir', but his letters to his trusted friend always began, 'My Dear Hardman'. Pugin developed total faith in his friend. In 1850, he wrote, 'I have lived to doubt everybody but you.'

E.184-2023