Philip Webb
The architect behind Red House.
Philip Webb designed Red House for William Morris in 1859 and was one of the founders of Arts and Crafts architecture.
Philip Webb was born in Oxford in 1831, the son of a doctor. He trained as an architect in Reading and then joined the Oxford office of George Edmund Street, one of the leading Gothic Revival architects of the day. There in 1856 he met the young William Morris, and they became lifelong friends.
Webb's first major independent commission was Red House in Bexleyheath, which he designed for Morris and his wife Jane in 1859. The house was built of red brick with steep roofs and was free of the elaborate façade ornament of the period. The plan was based on how the occupants wanted to live, not on symmetry. The house is now owned by the National Trust and is open to visitors.
Webb was one of the founders of Morris's firm in 1861 and designed furniture, glass, metalwork and jewellery. He also drew many of the animals and birds in the firm's stained glass and wallpapers. As an architect he designed country houses and town houses for a circle of artists and enlightened clients. Among his most important works are Clouds in Wiltshire from the 1880s and Standen in West Sussex from the 1890s, which also belongs to the National Trust and is still furnished with Morris patterns.
His architecture rests on local materials, traditional building and honest craftsmanship rather than on any particular style. He wanted his houses to blend into the landscape and feel natural. Webb was retiring and avoided publicity. He rarely published his drawings and did not enter architectural competitions. Together with Morris he helped found the society for the protection of ancient buildings in 1877, and he took part in Morris's socialist work.
Webb retired in 1900 and died in Sussex in 1915. He never married. Through pupils and followers such as the architect William Lethaby he had great influence on Arts and Crafts architecture and the English house. Today he is regarded as one of the most important forerunners of the simplicity and feeling for materials of modern architecture.