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Omega Workshops

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The Omega Workshops was a design enterprise founded by members of the Bloomsbury group and established in 1913. It was located at 33 Fitzroy Square in London.

Critic Roger Fry formed the company and works were shown anonymously, marked only with the letter omega.

Vanessa Bell and Duncan Grant produced designs for Omega, and Wyndham Lewis was initially part of the operation. Lewis however split off at an early stage, taking with him several other participants to start the Rebel Art Centre after accusing Fry of misappropriating a commission to decorate a room at the Ideal Home Exhibition in the autumn of 1913.

Edward Wolfe worked at the Omega Workshops handpainting candle-shades, trays and decorating furniture. Wolfe, who died in 1982, was one of the last of the Bloomsbury painters.

Omega closed in 1919, but became influential in interior design in the 1920s.

A revival of interest in Omega designs in the 1980s led to a reassessment of the place of the Bloomsbury group in visual arts.

See also