Émigré designers in the V&A’s Archive of Art and Design

Sketchbook, Tom Karen, ca. 1997. © Victoria and Albert Museum, London

V&A, London

The V&A’s Archive of Art and Design (AAD) is the UK’s leading collection of archives of applied art and design. It is a key destination for students, scholars and enthusiasts who are investigating the lives of designers and other practitioners, and the history of businesses and other organisations involved in applied art and design in Britain over the last two centuries.

Some of the most important contributors to British design in the mid- and late-twentieth century were Jewish émigrés, many of whom who escaped Nazi Germany in the 1930s or survived the persecution of the Second World War to make their homes in Britain in the 1940s. The working archives, and some private papers, of 28 Jewish designers and practitioners are represented in the AAD. Come along for a chance to hear about the life and work of some of these designers, including Hans Schleger, George Him, Jacqueline Groag and Gaby Schreiber, and to see a selection of their designs, photographs and papers.