Charles Robert Ashbee (17 May 1863 – 23 May 1942) was an English architect and designer who was a prime mover of the

Arts and Crafts movement The Arts and Crafts movement was an international trend in the decorative and fine arts that developed earliest and most fully in the British Isles and subsequently spread across the British Empire and to the rest of Europe and America. Initiat ...

, which took its craft ethic from the works of

John Ruskin John Ruskin (8 February 1819 20 January 1900) was an English polymath a writer, lecturer, art historian, art critic, draughtsman and philanthropist of the Victorian era. He wrote on subjects as varied as art, architecture, Critique of politic ...

and its co-operative structure from the socialism of

William Morris William Morris (24 March 1834 – 3 October 1896) was an English textile designer, poet, artist, writer, and socialist activist associated with the British Arts and Crafts movement. He was a major contributor to the revival of traditiona ...

. Ashbee was defined by one source as "designer, architect, entrepreneur, and social reformer". His disciplines included metalwork, textile design, furniture, jewellery and other objects in the

Modern Style (British Art Nouveau style) The Modern Style is a style of architecture, art, and design that first emerged in the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, United Kingdom in the mid-1880s. It was the first Art Nouveau style worldwide, and it represents the evolution of ...

and Arts and Crafts genres. He became an elected member of the

Art Workers' Guild The Art Workers' Guild is an organisation established in 1884 by a group of British painters, sculptors, architects, and designers associated with the ideas of William Morris and the Arts and Crafts movement. The guild promoted the 'unity of al ...

in 1892, and was elected as its Master in 1929.

Early life

Ashbee was born in 1863 in

Isleworth Isleworth ( ) is a suburban town in the London Borough of Hounslow, West London, England. It lies immediately east of Hounslow and west of the River Thames and its tributary the River Crane, London, River Crane. Isleworth's original area of ...

, then just West of the Victorian sprawl of London and now a suburb. He was the first child and only son of businessman

Henry Spencer Ashbee Henry Spencer Ashbee (21 April 1834 – 29 July 1900) was a book collector, writer and bibliographer. He is notable for his massive, clandestine three-volume bibliography of erotic literature published under the pseudonym of Pisanus Fraxi. Life ...

, the senior partner in the London branch of the firm of Charles Lavy & Co., and Elizabeth Jenny Lavi (1842–1919), daughter of his German business partner. His parents had married in Elizabeth's hometown of Hamburg, Germany on 27 June 1862. His mother's brother

Charles Lavy Christopher Hughes Edward Charles Lavy (16 August 1842 in Hamburg – 10 May 1928) was a German industrialist and politician, best remembered as proprietor of Charles Lavy & Company. He served as member of the Hamburg Parliament The Hamburg Par ...

(1842-1928) inherited the German firm and became a politician. Charles Robert had three sistersA. James Hammerton, "Cruelty and companionship: conflict in nineteenth-century married life", Routledge, 1992, , pp.144-145 Frances Mary (1866–1926), Agnes Jenny (1869–1926) and Elsa (1873–1944) Family life was not happy. As the father became more conservative, his family followed the progressive movement of the era. "The 'excessive education' of his daughters irritated him, his Jewish wife's pro-suffragism infuriated him, and he became estranged from his socialist homosexual son, Charles". Henry Spencer was, like his son after him, well travelled and a writer. He also became a notable erotic bibliophile. Charles Robert Ashbee went to

Wellington College Wellington College may refer to: New Zealand * Wellington College, Wellington, New Zealand * Wellington College of Education, now the Faculty of Education of Victoria University of Wellington, New Zealand * Wellington Girls' College, Wellington, N ...

and read History at

King's College, Cambridge King's College, formally The King's College of Our Lady and Saint Nicholas in Cambridge, is a List of colleges of the University of Cambridge, constituent college of the University of Cambridge. The college lies beside the River Cam and faces ...

, from 1883 to 1886, and studied under the architect

George Frederick Bodley George Frederick Bodley (14 March 182721 October 1907) was an English Gothic Revival architect. He was a pupil of Sir George Gilbert Scott and worked with C. E. Kempe. He was in partnership with Thomas Garner for much of his career and was ...

. Henry and Elisabeth separated in 1893.

Guild and School of Handicraft

Ashbee set up his

Guild and School of Handicraft The Guild and School of Handicraft was established in 1888 in London, later moving to Chipping Campden in Gloucestershire, England, as a community of artists and craftspeople by the arts and crafts architect Charles Robert Ashbee (1863-1942). Acc ...

in 1888 in London, while a resident at

Toynbee Hall Toynbee Hall is a charitable institution that works to address the causes and impacts of poverty in the East End of London and elsewhere. Established in 1884, it is based in Commercial Street, Spitalfields, and was the first university-affili ...

, one of the original

settlement Settlement may refer to: *Human settlement, a community where people live *Settlement (structural), downward movement of a structure's foundation *Settlement (finance), where securities are delivered against payment of money *Settlement (litigatio ...

s set up to alleviate

inner city The term inner city (also called the hood) has been used, especially in the United States, as a euphemism for majority-minority lower-income residential districts that often refer to rundown neighborhoods, in a downtown or city centre area. Soc ...

poverty, in this case, in the slums of

Whitechapel Whitechapel () is an area in London, England, and is located in the London Borough of Tower Hamlets. It is in east London and part of the East End of London, East End. It is the location of Tower Hamlets Town Hall and therefore the borough tow ...

. The fledgling venture was first housed in temporary space but by 1890 had workshops at Essex House,

Mile End Road The A11 is a major trunk road in England. It originally ran roughly north east from London to Norwich, Norfolk. It now consists of a short section in Inner London and a much longer section in Cambridgeshire, Suffolk and Norfolk. The lengthy se ...

, in the East End, with a retail outlet in the heart of the West End in fashionable

Brook Street Brook Street is an axial street in the exclusive central London district of Mayfair. Most of it is leasehold estate, leasehold, paying ground rent to and seeking lease renewals from the reversioner, that since before 1800, has been the Grosven ...

Mayfair Mayfair is an area of Westminster, London, England, in the City of Westminster. It is in Central London and part of the West End. It is between Oxford Street, Regent Street, Piccadilly and Park Lane and one of the most expensive districts ...

, more accessible to the Guild's patrons. The School closed in 1895, which Ashbee blamed on "the failure of the Technical Education Board of the L.C.C. to keep its word with the School Committee and the impossibility of carrying on costly educational work in the teeth of state aided competition." The following year the L.C.C. opened the

Central School of Arts and Crafts The Central School of Art and Design was a art school, school of fine arts, fine and applied arts in London, England. It offered foundation and degree level courses. It was established in 1896 by the London County Council as the Central School ...

. One of Ashbee's pupils in Mile End was

Frank Baines Sir Frank Baines, KCVO, CBE, FRIBA (1877–1933) was chief architect at the British Office of Works from 1920 to 1927. His most famous work was Thames House and its neighbour Imperial Chemical House (1929–30) in London. Thames House is ...

, later Sir Frank, who was enormously influential in keeping Arts and Crafts alive in 20th-century architecture. In 1902 the Guild moved to

Chipping Campden Chipping Campden is a market town in the Cotswold (district), Cotswold district of Gloucestershire, England. It is notable for its terraced High Street, dating from the 14th to the 17th centuries. A wool trading centre in the Middle Ages, Chipp ...

, in the

Gloucestershire Gloucestershire ( , ; abbreviated Glos.) is a Ceremonial counties of England, ceremonial county in South West England. It is bordered by Herefordshire to the north-west, Worcestershire to the north, Warwickshire to the north-east, Oxfordshire ...

Cotswolds The Cotswolds ( ) is a region of central South West England, along a range of rolling hills that rise from the meadows of the upper River Thames to an escarpment above the Severn Valley and the Vale of Evesham. The area is defined by the bedroc ...

, where a sympathetic community provided local patrons, but where the market for craftsman-designed furniture and metalwork was saturated by 1905. The Guild was liquidated in 1907. The Guild of Handicraft specialised in metalworking, producing jewellery and enamels as well as hand-wrought copper and wrought ironwork, and furniture. (A widely illustrated suite of furniture was made by the Guild to designs of M. H. Baillie Scott for

Ernest Louis, Grand Duke of Hesse Ernest Louis (; 25 November 1868 – 9 October 1937) was the last Grand Duke of Hesse and by Rhine, reigning from 1892 until 1918. Early life Ernest Louis was the elder son of Louis IV, Grand Duke of Hesse and by Rhine and Princess Alice of ...

Darmstadt Darmstadt () is a city in the States of Germany, state of Hesse in Germany, located in the southern part of the Frankfurt Rhine Main Area, Rhine-Main-Area (Frankfurt Metropolitan Region). Darmstadt has around 160,000 inhabitants, making it the ...

.) The School attached to the Guild taught crafts. The Guild operated as a co-operative, and its stated aim was to: Ashbee himself often designed objects to be made of silver and other metals: belt buckles, jewellery, cutlery and tableware, for example. Among the pioneers of artistic jewelry, Ashbee emphasized that the value of an ornament lay in its artistic quality rather than the material’s commercial worth. His designs featured nature-inspired motifs like carnations, roses, and violets, often crafted in silver with a subdued polish that evoked the rich tone of antique silver. Ashbee also incorporated semi-precious stones, such as amethysts, amber, and rough pearls, not for their intrinsic value, but to add subtle color and decorative effect.

Architecture and design in Europe

As an architect, he was willing to do complete house design, including interior furniture and decoration, as well as items such as fireplaces. In the 1890s he renovated The Wodehouse near

Wombourne Wombourne is a major village and civil parish located in the district of South Staffordshire, in the county of Staffordshire, England. It is 4 miles (6 km) south-west of Wolverhampton and on the border with the former West Midlands Co ...

Staffordshire Staffordshire (; postal abbreviation ''Staffs''.) is a Ceremonial counties of England, ceremonial county in the West Midlands (region), West Midlands of England. It borders Cheshire to the north-west, Derbyshire and Leicestershire to the east, ...

for Colonel Thomas Shaw-Hellier, commandant of the

Royal Military School of Music The Royal Military School of Music (RMSM) trains musicians for the British Army's fourteen regular bands, as part of the Royal Corps of Army Music. For more than a century and a half, from 1857 until August 2021, the school was based at Knell ...

, adding a billiard room and chapel, amid many external changes. Shaw-Hellier commissioned him in 1907 to build the Villa San Giorgio in

Taormina Taormina ( , , also , ; ) is a ''comune'' (municipality) in the Metropolitan City of Messina, on the east coast of the island of Sicily, Italy. Taormina has been a tourist destination since the 19th century. Its beaches on the Ionian Sea, incl ...

Sicily Sicily (Italian language, Italian and ), officially the Sicilian Region (), is an island in the central Mediterranean Sea, south of the Italian Peninsula in continental Europe and is one of the 20 regions of Italy, regions of Italy. With 4. ...

, as a little island of England in Italy, hence the name of the

patron saint A patron saint, patroness saint, patron hallow or heavenly protector is a saint who in Catholicism, Anglicanism, Eastern Orthodoxy or Oriental Orthodoxy is regarded as the heavenly advocate of a nation, place, craft, activity, class, clan, fa ...

(see

History of Taormina Taormina dates to around 396 BC after Dionysius I of Syracuse destroyed nearby Naxos (Sicily), Naxos in 403 BC and the Siculi formed a new settlement on the nearby Mount Taurus which gradually grew up into the city of Tauromenium () (modern Taorm ...

). His biographer

Fiona MacCarthy Fiona Caroline MacCarthy (23 January 1940 – 29 February 2020) was a British biographer and cultural historian best known for her studies of 19th- and 20th-century art and design. Early life and education Fiona MacCarthy was born in Sutton, ...

judges it "the most impressive of Ashbee's remaining buildings"; it is run as the Hotel Ashbee. He also designed buildings in Budapest and London, including several studios in

Cheyne Walk Cheyne Walk is a historic road in Chelsea, London, England, in the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea. It runs parallel with the River Thames. Before the construction of Chelsea Embankment reduced the width of the Thames here, it fronted t ...

, Chelsea and his own family home at 37 Cheyne Walk.

Survey of London

Ashbee also founded the ''

Survey of London The Survey of London is a research project to produce a comprehensive architectural survey of central London and its suburbs, or the area formerly administered by the London County Council. It was founded in 1894 by Charles Robert Ashbee, an A ...

''. The Oxford Reference (

Oxford University Press Oxford University Press (OUP) is the publishing house of the University of Oxford. It is the largest university press in the world. Its first book was printed in Oxford in 1478, with the Press officially granted the legal right to print books ...

) provides this summary: "Mindful of the huge losses of historic buildings through redevelopment, he began a process of surveying London buildings that led to the important Survey of London volumes."

Book author and publisher

Ashbee was involved in book production and literary work. He set up the Essex House Press after Morris's

Kelmscott Press The Kelmscott Press, founded by William Morris and Emery Walker, published 53 books in 66 volumes between 1891 and 1898. Each book was designed and ornamented by Morris and printed by hand in limited editions of around 300. Many books were illus ...

closed in 1897, taking on many of the displaced printers and craftsmen. Between 1898 and 1910 the Essex House Press produced more than 70 titles. Ashbee designed two type faces for the Press, ' (1901) and ''Prayer Book'' (1903), both of which are based on Morris's

Golden Type The Golden Type is a serif typeface designed by artist William Morris for his fine book printing project, the Kelmscott Press, in 1890. It is an "old-style" serif face, based on type designed by engraver and printer Nicolas Jenson in Venice aroun ...

. In 1906, Ashbee published "A Book of Cottages and Little Houses" and, in 1909, "Modern English Silverwork". In 1924, after concluding a job as civic advisor to the city of

Jerusalem Jerusalem is a city in the Southern Levant, on a plateau in the Judaean Mountains between the Mediterranean Sea, Mediterranean and the Dead Sea. It is one of the List of oldest continuously inhabited cities, oldest cities in the world, and ...

, Ashbee wrote a report titled ''Jerusalem, 1920-1922, Being the Records of the Pro-Jerusalem Council During the First Two Years of the Civil Administration''. Ashbee wrote two

utopian novels A utopia ( ) typically describes an imagined community or society that possesses highly desirable or near-perfect qualities for its members. It was coined by Sir Thomas More for his 1516 book ''Utopia'', which describes a fictional island societ ...

influenced by Morris, ''From Whitechapel to Camelot'' (1892) and ''The Building of Thelema'' (1910), the latter named after the abbey in

François Rabelais François Rabelais ( , ; ; born between 1483 and 1494; died 1553) was a French writer who has been called the first great French prose author. A Renaissance humanism, humanist of the French Renaissance and Greek scholars in the Renaissance, Gr ...

' book ''

Gargantua and Pantagruel ''The Five Books of the Lives and Deeds of Gargantua and Pantagruel'' (), often shortened to ''Gargantua and Pantagruel'' or the (''Five Books''), is a pentalogy of novels written in the 16th century by François Rabelais. It tells the advent ...

''.

Jerusalem (1918–1923)

In 1918 Ashbee was appointed civic adviser to the British Administration for Palestine, within the

Occupied Enemy Territory Administration The Occupied Enemy Territory Administration (OETA) was a joint British, French and Arab military administration over the Levantine provinceswhich had been part of the Ottoman Empire for four centuriesbetween 1918 and 1920, set up on 23 October ...

, later

Mandatory Palestine Mandatory Palestine was a British Empire, British geopolitical entity that existed between 1920 and 1948 in the Palestine (region), region of Palestine, and after 1922, under the terms of the League of Nations's Mandate for Palestine. After ...

, overseeing building works and the protection of historic sites and monuments as the chairman of the

Pro-Jerusalem Society The Pro-Jerusalem Society was a society for the "preservation and advancement of the interests of Jerusalem", including its amenities, antiquities, cultural institutions and education. It was founded in 1918 in Jerusalem by Sir Ronald Storrs, the B ...

. His official title was Honorary Secretary to the Council, which was the leading board of the Society. He summoned his family to

, where they lived until 1923. Ashbee served as Civic Adviser to the City of Jerusalem (1919-1922) and as a professional adviser to the Town Planning Commission. Described as "the most pro-Arab and

anti-Zionist Anti-Zionism is opposition to Zionism. Although anti-Zionism is a heterogeneous phenomenon, all its proponents agree that the creation of the State of Israel in 1948, and the movement to create a sovereign Jewish state in the Palestine (region) ...

" of the six British planners, Ashbee's view of the city "was colored by a romantic sense of the vernacular." Aiming to protect this Palestinian vernacular and the city's secular and traditional fabric, Ashbee oversaw conservation and repair work in the city, and revived the craft industry there to repair the damaged Dome of the Rock.

Personal life

Ashbee has been described as "half-Jewish, Anglican, bisexual, married, Socialist, conservationist, romantic, rebel,

fop ''Fop'' was a pejorative term for a man excessively concerned with his appearance and clothes in 17th-century England. Some of the many similar alternative terms are: ''coxcomb'', ''fribble'', ''popinjay'' (meaning 'parrot'), ''dandy'', ''fas ...

, and self-described "practical idealist"". Ashbee was homosexual at a time when sex between men was a criminal offence. He is thought to have been a member of the

Order of Chaeronea The Order of Chaeronea was a secret society for the cultivation of a homosexual moral, ethical, cultural, and spiritual ethos. Founded by George Cecil Ives in 1897, based on his belief that homosexuals would not be accepted openly in society, the ...

, a

secret society A secret society is an organization about which the activities, events, inner functioning, or membership are concealed. The society may or may not attempt to conceal its existence. The term usually excludes covert groups, such as intelligence ag ...

founded in 1897 by the poet and penal reformer George Ives for the cultivation of a homosexual ethos. He certainly belonged to groups that provided support and understanding to homosexuals. In 1898, seemingly to cover his homosexuality, Ashbee married the daughter of a wealthy London stockbroker, Janet Elizabeth Forbes (1877–1961), to whom he admitted his sexual orientation soon after she accepted his proposal. During thirteen years of rocky marriage, which included a serious affair of his wife's, they had four children: Mary, Helen, Prudence, and Felicity. Mary Ashbee, later Ames-Lewis (1911–2004) was born at Chipping Campden; Jane Felicity Ashbee (1913–2008), Helen Christabel Ashbee, later Cristofanetti (1915–1998) and Prudence Margaret Ashbee (1917–1979) were all born at Broad Campden. Ashbee was influenced in his life by the theories of homosexuality developed by

Edward Carpenter Edward Carpenter (29 August 1844 – 28 June 1929) was an English utopian socialist, poet, philosopher, anthologist, an early activist for gay rights and prison reform whilst advocating vegetarianism and taking a stance against vivise ...

Death

Ashbee died in 1942 at

Sevenoaks Sevenoaks is a town in Kent with a population of 29,506, situated south-east of London, England. Also classified as a civil parishes in England, civil parish, Sevenoaks is served by a commuter South Eastern Main Line, main line railway into Lo ...

and was buried at St Peter and St Paul's Church in

Seal Seal may refer to any of the following: Common uses * Pinniped, a diverse group of semi-aquatic marine mammals, many of which are commonly called seals, particularly: ** Earless seal, also called "true seal" ** Fur seal ** Eared seal * Seal ( ...

, Kent, where he was church architect. The internal screen for the church tower was designed by Ashbee.

Personal archive and legacy

His papers and journals are at King's College, Cambridge. Ashbee's unpublished personal memoirs, all 7 volumes, are held at the

London Library The London Library is an Subscription library, independent lending library in London, established in 1841. Membership is open to all, on payment of an annual subscription, with life and corporate memberships also available. As of December 2023 ...

. The East End Preservation Society has presented an annual CR Ashbee Memorial Lecture since 2015: *2015 -

Oliver Wainwright Oliver Wainwright (born July 1984) is a British architecture and design critic. He has written for the British newspapers ''The Guardian'' and ''The Times'' and is the Features Editor for the industry magazine ''Building Design''. He trained an ...

on the ''Seven Dark Arts of Developers'' *2016 -

Rowan Moore Rowan William Gillachrist Moore (born 22 March 1961) is an architecture critic. Biography Moore was born on 22 March 1961. His brother is the journalist, newspaper editor and Margaret Thatcher's official biographer Charles Moore, Baron Moore ...

on ''The Future of London'' *2017 - Maria Brenton, Rachel Bagenal and Kareem Dayes on ''Hope in the Housing Crisis''. *2018 - The Gentle Author of the ''Spitalfields Life'' blog on ''CR Ashbee in the East End''. *2020 - Peter Barber on ''Hundred mile city & other stories''

References

External links

Victorian Web: C. R. Ashbee, an overview
guide to illustrations
Court Barn Museum
in

Chipping Camden Chipping Campden is a market town in the Cotswold (district), Cotswold district of Gloucestershire, England. It is notable for its terraced High Street, dating from the 14th to the 17th centuries. A wool trading centre in the Middle Ages, Chipp ...

: Life and works of Ashbee and other members of the Guild * {{DEFAULTSORT:Ashbee, Charles Robert 1863 births 1942 deaths Alumni of King's College, Cambridge Arts and Crafts architects Arts and Crafts movement artists Administrators of Palestine Architects from Mandatory Palestine Businesspeople from the London Borough of Hounslow English graphic designers 19th-century English novelists 20th-century English novelists English printers English socialists English gay artists English gay writers English LGBTQ novelists English LGBTQ businesspeople Gay novelists Gay businessmen LGBTQ people from London People educated at Wellington College, Berkshire Architects from London Private press movement people Masters of the Art Worker's Guild 19th-century English LGBTQ people 20th-century English LGBTQ people People from Isleworth