Nelson Dawson

After being trained in fine art and metalwork at the South Kensington Schools between 1885 and 1887, Dawson (1859-1941) began a career as a landscape artist. He married Edith Robinson, who had studied metalwork at the South Kensington Schools, in 1893. In 1895 Nelson and Edith Dawson began working predominantly in metalwork. Dawson designed and made metalwork items including lights, bath taps, church metalwork and the trowel used by Queen Victoria for laying the foundation stone of the Victoria & Albert Museum in 1899. In 1901 Dawson became the director of the newly founded Artificers' Guild. He became an active painter again in 1914.