A Stunning Seafront Arts & Crafts House Design

From our new collection of pictures by talented late-Victorian architect Philip J. Marvin (1849–1931) is this stunning design proposal for a seafront Arts & Crafts house c.1880s. Presumed to be on the Isle of Wight, where Marvin was born and returned to later in his career as Architect to the Admiralty, the design incorporates many crafted and historical features, such as the church-like weathervane and sundial, leaded windows, and the red tile hanging to the first storey walls, which were popular at the time to give a vernacular feel. Much of Philip Marvin's architectural work was in Gothic Revival style, so it is interesting to consider the way in which historicism closely informed modern Arts and Crafts design. The potential Isle of Wight location is interesting too, in the context of the cultural life of the island at that time: Alfred Tennyson at Farringford, the Prinsep family, photographer Julia Margaret Cameron (who had her large property on the island modified in a Gothic style—see image 3), and the artist George Frederic Watts, for whom the pioneering Arts and Crafts architect Philip Webb designed The Briary at Freshwater—see image 4.