Sydney Gordon Russell

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Sir (Sydney) Gordon Russell (20 May 1892 – 7 October 1980) was an English designer, craftsman and educationist.

He came under the influence of the Arts and Crafts movement from 1904 after his father had moved to Broadway in the Cotswolds to be hotelier at the Lygon Arms, through the Guild of Handicraft, the community of metalworkers, enamellers, wood carvers, furniture makers, and printers brought in 1902 by C. R. Ashbee from east London to Chipping Campden.

Following service in World War I he became a furniture maker and designer.

During World War II he developed utility furniture as chairman of the government's Utility Furniture Design Panel.

In 1947 Gordon Russell became director of the Council of Industrial Design (COID) (later renamed the Design Council.

He became the first chairman of the Crafts Council.

He was awarded a knighthood in 1955 for services to design.

Notable designs by him include chairs for the re-built Coventry Cathedral.

His brother Richard Drew Russell was also a designer.

[edit] Sources

Fiona MacCarthy, "Russell, Sir (Sydney) Gordon (1892–1980)", Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, Oxford University Press, Sept 2004; online edn, May 2006 accessed 9 Dec 2006