Horne, Herbert P. (Herbert Percy), 1864-1916

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English architect, book designer, literary critic, and art historian.

From the description of Letters, 1891-1912. (Unknown). WorldCat record id: 86130302

Epithet: of Add MS 38905

British Library Archives and Manuscripts Catalogue : Person : Description : ark:/81055/vdc_100000001094.0x0003a5

Epithet: architect art collector and art historian

British Library Archives and Manuscripts Catalogue : Person : Description : ark:/81055/vdc_100000000977.0x0003d2

Shannon and Ricketts were connected with The Dial at this time (1890); Horne was a book designer and published The Hobby Horse.

From the description of Letters from Charles Shannon, 1888-1894. (Unknown). WorldCat record id: 754866389

Biographical Note

Herbert Percy Horne was borne in the Bedford Park section of London on February 18, 1864, the son of Henry or Horace Horne, an architect and art collector, and Miss Porter of Russell Square, the daughter of a surveyor. He was educated at St. Paul's in London, completing his formal schooling at a time when the aesthetic movement was in full flower.

Following brief training as a surveyor, Horne was apprenticed in 1883 to designer/architect A.H. Mackmurdo, one of the creators of English art nouveau. Within two years, at the age of only 20, he had become Mackmurdo's architectural partner.

Horne's association with Mackmurdo coincided with the development of the Century Guild, an organization of craftsmen founded in 1882 by Mackmurdo and Selwyn Image. Horne designed textiles and wallpapers for the group and was actively involved in the creation of its art magazine The Century Guild Hobby Horse. He contributed illustrations and a poem entitled The Fraise to the first trial issue of the magazine put out in 1884; and, when The Hobby Horse resumed publication in 1886, Horne had become the magazine's joint editor, a position he held until 1892.

During this same period, Horne was active in London literary circles as a member of the Rhymers' Club with W.B. Yeats, Ernest Dowson, Lionel Johnson, Edgar Jepson, Arthur Symons, and others.

Though still in his twenties, Horne already enjoyed a considerable reputation in London. Bernard Berenson, who met him there in 1888 and later renewed the acquaintance in Italy, proclaimed him the successor to William Morris, the great man of the next generation, an architect, painter, poet, fine critic and editor of The Hobby Horse.

By 1890, Horne's deteriorating relationship with Mackmurdo had resulted in the dissolution of their architectural partnership. For the next several years, Horne continued his London literary and artistic activities - designing title pages for Elkin Mathews and other publishers, and producing a volume of verse Diversi Colores (1891) and the very successful The Binding of Books: An Essay in the History of Gold-tooled Bindings (1894) - but, in 1895, apparently increasingly dissatisfied with London life, Horne began to spend more and more time abroad in Italy. By 1900, he had settled permanently in Florence.

Over the next seven years, Horne devoted his energies increasingly to art history and criticism, particularly the research and writing of his massive study of Botticelli. This critically acclaimed work with photo-sculptist reproductions by Emery Walker was finally published in 1908.

While in Florence, Horne, too, continued his interest in book and type design. He collaborated with bookbinder Sarah Prideux, designing her 1903 publication of The Elements of Architecture by Sir Henry Wotton; and designing three typefaces, all Romans based on 15th century Italian models. The earliest [UNK] - the Montallegro - was cut for Boston printer Daniel Berkeley Updike of the Merrymount Press. It was first used for The Life of Michelangniolo Buonarroti (1904), and later for Merrymount's Humanists' Library series. The Florence face, designed for Chatto and Windus' Florence Press, and the Riccardi Press type, used for books published by Philip Lee Warner for the Medici Society, were both cut on 1909.

In 1911, after more than a decade in Italy, Horne at last purchased a Florentine palazzo to house his collection of primitives, Renaissance furniture and applied art, and Old Master drawings.

Herbert Percy Horne died on April 4, 1916. The palazzo and collections which he left to the city of Florence are now the Museo Horne.

From the guide to the Herbert Percy Horne Letters, 1891-1912, (Stanford University. Libraries. Dept. of Special Collections and University Archives.)

Archival Resources
Role Title Holding Repository
creatorOf Yeats, W. B. (William Butler), 1865-1939. W.B. Yeats letters and memorandum, 1891-1933. Pennsylvania State University Libraries
referencedIn Papers of Paul J. Sachs, 1903-2005 Harvard Art Museums. Archives
referencedIn Sir William Rothenstein correspondence and other papers, 1887-1957. Houghton Library
creatorOf Horne, Herbert P. (Herbert Percy), 1864-1916. Letters from Charles Shannon, 1888-1894. Stanford University. Department of Special Collections and University Archives
creatorOf Horne, Herbert Percy, 1864-1916. Autograph letter signed : London, to T.J. Cobden Sanderson, 1893 Dec. 6. Pierpont Morgan Library.
creatorOf Horne, Herbert P. (Herbert Percy), 1864-1916. Letters, 1891-1912. Stanford University. Department of Special Collections and University Archives
creatorOf Vol. CXVII. 1906-1909.Charles de Sousy Ricketts, alias 'Jean Paul Raymond'; RA: Thomas Robert Way, artist and printmaker: Letters to Thomas Robert Way from Charles de Sousy Ricketts: [1906]-1907.Robert Baldwin Ross, literary executor of Oscar Wilde: ..., 1906-1909 British Library
referencedIn Pugh, Elinor M. Letters concerning Herbert P. Horne, Lionel Pigot Johnson and Arthur H. Mackmurdo, 1943-1958. Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library
referencedIn Vol. VIII (ff. 117). 1885,1886.includes:ff. 1, 12 John Duke Coleridge, 1st Baron Coleridge: Letters to W. C. Hazlitt: 1884, 1885. ff. 3, 4, 39, 49, 68, 104 Reverend James Augustus Hessey, Headmaster of Merchant Taylors' School: Letters to W. C. Hazl..., 1885-1886 British Library
creatorOf Horne, Herbert P. (Herbert Percy), 1864-1916. Letters, 1902-1913, to Roger Fry. Stanford University. Department of Special Collections and University Archives
creatorOf Becker, John J. Morning song : motet / music by John J. Becker ; words adapted by composer from poem by Herbert P. Hornè. University of Cincinnati - Main Campus, Langsam Library
creatorOf Yeats, W. B. (William Butler), 1865-1939. William Butler Yeats letters and memorandum, 1891-1934. Pennsylvania State University Libraries
creatorOf Vol. CXVI. 1902-1905.Sir Claude Phillips, Keeper of the Wallace Collection: Robert Baldwin Ross, literary executor of Oscar Wilde: Letters to Robert Baldwin Ross from Sir Claude Phillips: 1902-[1918], n.d.Robert Baldwin Ross, literary executor of Osc..., 1902-1905 British Library
creatorOf Shields, Frederic, 1833-1911. Correspondence, ca. 1873-1909. Getty Research Institute
creatorOf Vol. CXIX. 1912-1913.Robert Baldwin Ross, literary executor of Oscar Wilde: Lilias Margaret Frances Bathurst, wife of Seymour, 7th Earl Bathurst: Letter, etc., to Robert Baldwin Ross from Lilias Margaret Frances Bathurst: 1912: Signed.T. Werner Lauri..., 1912-1913 British Library
referencedIn Pugh, Elinor M. Letters concerning Herbert P. Horne, Lionel Pigot Johnson and Arthur H. Mackmurdo, 1943-1958. Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library
creatorOf Herbert Percy Horne Letters, 1891-1912 Stanford University. Department of Special Collections and University Archives
Role Title Holding Repository
Relation Name
associatedWith Ainslie, Douglas, 1865-1948. person
associatedWith Becker, John J. person
associatedWith Cobden-Sanderson, T. J. (Thomas James), 1840-1922. person
associatedWith Fry, Roger Eliot, 1866-1934. person
associatedWith Jepson, Edgar, 1863-1938. person
associatedWith Prideaux, Sarah, 1863-1933. person
associatedWith Pugh, Elinor M. person
associatedWith Ricketts, Charles S., 1866-1931. person
correspondedWith Rothenstein, William, Sir, 1872-1945 person
associatedWith Sachs, Paul J., 1878-1965 person
associatedWith Shannon, Charles Hazelwood, 1863-1937. person
associatedWith Shields, Frederic, 1833-1911. person
associatedWith Smithers, Leonard C. (Leonard Charles), 1861-1907. person
associatedWith Sutton, Denys. person
associatedWith Symons, Arthur, 1865-1945. person
associatedWith White, Gleeson, 1851-1898. person
associatedWith Yeats, W. B. (William Butler), 1865-1939. person
Place Name Admin Code Country
Great Britain
Hollingbury, Sussex
England
Subject
Printing
Book design
Book design
English literature
English literature
Occupation
Activity

Person

Birth 1864-02-18

Death 1916-04-14

Britons

English

Information

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