The Arts & Crafts Movement Watts Cemetery Chapel in Compton near Guildford in Surrey dating from 1904.
George Frederic Watts, OM, RA was a popular English Victorian painter and sculptor associated with the Symbolist movement. He became famous in his lifetime for his allegorical works. In 1886 at the age of 69 Watts re-married, to Mary Fraser Tytler, a Scottish designer and potter, then aged 36. In 1891 he bought land near Compton, south of Guildford, in Surrey. The couple named the house "Limnerslease" (combining the words "limner" or artist with "leasen" or glean) and built the Watts Gallery nearby, a museum dedicated to his work –- the first (and now the only) purpose-built gallery in Britain devoted to a single artist –- which opened in April 1904, shortly before his death. Watts's wife Mary had designed the nearby earlier Watts Mortuary Chapel, which Watts paid for and also painted a version of The All-Pervading for the altar only three months before he died. Watts Cemetery Chapel is a Grade I listed building which stands on Budburrow Hill in Compton near Guildford in Surrey. In May 1894 Compton Parish Council announced their plans to purchase this plot of land to use as burial ground. Four years later, on 1st July 1898, the Chapel was consecrated by the Bishop of Winchester and today it is still a working cemetery chapel. Visitors are drawn to the bright red brick of this Arts and Crafts masterpiece. Up close the extraordinary design and decoration both fascinates and overwhelms. Mary Watts (1849-1938) most likely had the vision to design, build and decorate the Chapel in 1891. George and Mary Watts had recently built Limnerslease in Compton, which became their winter residence.
Size: 3610px × 4512px
Location: Compton, Guildford, Surrey UK
Photo credit: © Niall Ferguson / Alamy / Afripics
License: Licensed
Model Released: No
Keywords: &, aesthetic, arts, brick, cemetery, chapel, compton, crafts, gallery, guildford, limnerslease, movement, red, watts
