Google William Morris 1834-96 and the results you will get are all wallpaper and fabrics, still being made and still for sale. He was a great decorator but he was also much more than that, an artist, poet, novelist, entrepreneur, all round designer, craftsman, printer-publisher, politician and visionary. His vision was of a new society in which manufacturing was returned to the craft workshop, where people found joy in making things of beauty, utility and quality. Cities and factories would be demolished as people returned to their rural communities where they would rediscover brotherhood, mutual endeavour and self reliance. It was a vision based on a romantic view of the medieval economy - craftsmanship, guilds, self governing small towns and common ownership. His furniture, like the paintings of his friend Burne-Jones is an imagined and idealised medievalism. Furniture to be craftsman made, not mass produced, solid, honest and decorated with paint or with a few rustic motifs.
I have been drawing some plans to make a William Morris table taken from photographs of a surviving piece. I haven't seen the piece so I can't be totally certain that I have the overall dimensions correct but I am pretty sure I have it close. I am posting them in pdf in alt.binaries.pictures.woodworking. I would welcome any feedback. In particular I tried to draw up the plans so they could be used by beginners to produce a small piece of furniture. I would like to know if you think I have been successful. The design is particularly well suited for a couple of weekends hand tool work cutting some simple joints in solid pine.
Tim W