A View of Kelmscott Manor from across the Garden
May Morris (1862-1938)
Category
Art / Drawings and watercolours
Date
circa 1880
Materials
Watercolour on paper
Measurements
350 x 250 mm
Order this imageCollection
Wightwick Manor, West Midlands
NT 1288006
Summary
Watercolour on paper, A View of Kelmscott Manor from across the Garden by May Morris (1862-1938), circa 1880. In the late 1870s and early 1880s May Morris made numerous drawings of landscapes, gardens, and buildings in watercolour and pencil, including this, Kelmscott Manor from the summerhouse (WIG/ D/ 24) and Kelmscott Manor from the Home Mead (WIG/ D/ 99). Kelmscott Manor, a 16th and 17th century house in Oxfordshire, was William Morris' country home which he rented from 1870 onwards, initially with Dante Gabriel Rossetti. Morris had a great affection for the house: he named both his London home in Hammersmith and his Press after it, and it appears as the frontispiece of the Kelmscott Press edition of his News From Nowhere (1892). This view shows the north front of the house and the old-fashioned cottage garden. Jane Morris purchased it in 1913. After the death of May Morris in 1938 the house eventually passed to the Society of Antiquaries, but the contents were dispersed at the sale following the death of her companion Miss Lobb in 1939.
Provenance
Jane Morris; May Morris; Miss Lobb; purchased by Sir Geoffrey and Lady Mander at the sale of the contents of Kelmscott Manor 19 and 20 July 1939 (probably lot 299)
Marks and inscriptions
Kelmscott Manor' Watercolour by Miss May Morris given to Mrs William Morris. (label)
Makers and roles
May Morris (1862-1938), artist