Gordon Russell

Gordon Russell loved the Cotswolds but he wanted to marry Cotswold traditions to modernity. In 1919 he started a furniture-making firm in Broadway. The work was hand-made at first, but then shifted to machine-made modernism. In the 1940s he carried his ideas to government committees in London, arguing for good design in industry. Thanks to his mingled loyalties, he became one of the most influential figures in British twentieth-century design.