This printed furnishing cotton is typical of an expensive but popular furnishing fabric available in the middle of the 19th century, used for curtains and loose covers on chairs and beds, especially in summer. It was manufactured for and retailed by the soft furnishings and furniture shop C. Hindley & Sons, who took over the established firm of Miles & Edwards in 1844. The shop was at 134 Oxford Street, London.

Many similar fabrics (‘known as chintz’) were exhibited at the Great Exhibition of 1851 by other London firms. Some were chosen by Henry Cole for his exhibition in 1852 of ‘False Principles in Design’ at the Museum of Ornamental Art, Marlborough House, London, in 1852. Cole and his colleague Richard Redgrave criticised floral chintzes that were not symmetrical, and tried to capture realistic, three-dimensional natural forms with their patterns. They argued that designs directly imitating flowers (rather than use of stylised repeating shapes) were unsuitable for textiles intended for draped and folded curtains.