Printed bottom right: Liberty of London, Raoul Dufy.

The design of this scarf, by the artist Raoul Dufy, was acquired and used by Liberty of London in the late 1970s. It was originally block-printed by the Lyons textile company Bianchini-Férier, and used by the couturier Paul Poiret who had been instrumental in encouraging Dufy to take up textile design. The French actress Elise Fournier was photographed in August 1920 wearing a Poiret outfit which had a skirt of a virtually identical scallop shell pattern.

Dufy was an accomplished wood-engraver with an interest in popular prints and naïve images, which is apparent in the scarf’s bold contrasts and seeming roughness of execution.