Trousers & the Most Important Precious Ornament

1937

Special Collections GT521 G52 1937

London: Faber & Faber

Clothes and nakedness were topics that Eric Gill, designer and sculptor, was passionate about. One of his polemics was Trousers & the Most Important Precious Ornament (1937). For women Gill felt plainness was the thing, like uniforms. He disliked accessories such as scents, paint, short skirts, bare backs and chests. Vanity in the male was a virtue to him. He felt men should by nature be clothed and should aim for dignity and decency. He himself adopted a worker’s smock as his attire, most often without underwear (which he disliked).