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Maurice was an inspired designer and turned an already well respected business into an international success sending work all over the world and working for Royalty, celebrities and well known clients from the entertainment and music world. Maurice had eight children, three of whom continue the spirit of the family business to this day.
Our family connection to the fabric industry is strong, long and continues to grow.
19th Century
In 1849, Jonas Giddens was born into a modest Cambridgeshire farming family who had lived and farmed a small 22 acre farm in Chatteris for generations. He was the first to break from the farming heritage and took the family’s first steps into the fabric industry. In the 1870’s Jonas was employed by a “Mr Dixon Dawson”, a silk merchant in Southampton, where he worked as a Drapers Assistant. In 1875 he married Mary Anne Orchard and moved to Wareham in Dorset. By the 1880’s, Jonas was living on the Isle of White where he worked as a Draper’s Manager selling cloth, fabrics and associated sundries. He and Mary had three children, William and Herbert and a daughter Eleanor. He continued in the trade as a “draper’s commercial traveller” selling fabric across the country and residing in Wales and Shepton Mallet.
Jonas Giddens
(1849-
Herbert Giddens
(1878-
Jonas’ youngest son, Herbert, was born in 1878 and followed his father into the industry. Jonas died in Lincoln in 1934 aged 85, having seen his son and grandson establish themselves in the industry with their own upholstery and drapers business.
20th Century
At the turn of the century, Herbert was living and working in Manchester at the heart of the fabric trade. Like his father, he was beginning a career as a Draper’s Assistant. By 1907 he was travelling the country with his work and had met Violet Wilson. Originally from Nottinghamshire, they married in Blandford in Dorset but were back in Nottinghamshire by the following year when their first child, Reginald Elliot, was born in Worksop. They settled in Lincoln where Herbert established a successful upholstery business “H E Giddens” trading from workshops on Steep Hill, in the Heart of the City.
R.E. Giddens
(1908-
By the 1930’s Reginald was established as a driving force in the business and his skill and enthusiasm was pushing it forward. By the 1960’s the business had grown into new premises on Drury Lane in Lincoln.
Reginald married Josephine McIvoy in 1929 and they had two children. Kenneth was born in 1931 followed by Maurice two years later. Both children were to go on to spend their working lives in interiors and furnishing, Maurice taking on the business whilst Kenneth moved to London.
Maurice Giddens
(1933-
In many respects the world of soft furnishing and interiors is now quite different to how Jonas and Herbert would have known it, on the other hand, if they could walk into our workshops today they would see the same tools, sewing machines and probably some of the same timeless classic fabrics from Sanderson and Morris that they used themselves when they were first available. (ok, the sewing machines are modern, but the design hasn’t changed much) What they would recognise are the methods we use in our make up, the painstaking hand sewing and the attention to the quality of the finished product. Some things will never change.
Patricia Giddens
Sarah Clark
Philip Giddens
Our History
The Present Day
Philip continues the business from its Lincoln base, Patricia runs her own successful soft furnishing business based in Regent Street in London. Sarah runs Clark & English from their Midlands base.