The Carpet
On 13 November 1838, Dickens paid £14/15/16, a substantial sum, to Duckham & Co., carpet makers. It is reasonable to assume this was for a good quality carpet to be laid in a principal room of the house. When he was planning to move out of Doughty Street, Dickens proposed, out of consideration, to leave the drawing room carpet for the next tenat. This suggests it was fitted and of good quality, quite possibly the carpet from Duckham's. There exist several versions of a sketch of Dickens by George Cruikshank, believed to be the result of a sitting in the drawing room at Doughty Street. One version shows what seems to be a fitted carpet with a zigzag patter. However, this sketch was made in the early Doughty Street days, and our reconstruction is of the last weeks of his stay, so it was necessary to seek a different source for an apropriate pattern. The most common style of carpet, shown in middle class ineteriors illustrated in Dickens's books of this period, feature a lozenge pattern. Added to that is the fact that Dickens, whenever he speaks of carpet design, whether in letters or fiction, speaks of flower motifs (see Hard Times, I ii). A carpet has therefore been selected incorporating both these features. It is a fitted Brussels carpet (i.e. uncut loop pile) of a design dating from 1829.