Lululaund
Lululaund, in Bushey, Hertfordshire was the villa of the German -born British artist Hubert von Herkomer. It was designed around 1886 and began to build and was inhabited from about 1894. Nevertheless Herkomer listed in 1911 in his autobiography:
"Finish it is not, and I would not like to see that the last handle would be done. The house should always have the opportunity to continue to grow, otherwise dried up the expectation, and with it the greatest charm of life. "
At least two generations earlier had dreamed in the family Herkomer them to build a house that should be as flat as monument of the family. Only Hubert, it was economically feasible to implement this dream. His father and two of his three uncles were involved in this project, what the painter, next to his autobiography and family history, including the triptych The Makers of my House praised [ The builders of my house ]: Uncle John, cabinetmaker and wood sculptors such as Hubert's father Lorenz, gave his successful operation in America to manage the building, and Uncle Anton, a weaver who settled on Long Iceland, controlled the hand-woven velvet brocade fabrics in accordance with the designs of his nephew.
1882-83 and 1885-86 to Herkomer had twice held up for several months in the United States to give lectures and been ordered to paint portraits. Early in 1886, he portrayed the renowned American architect Henry Hobson Richardson, in which he demanded a draft of a house as a fee, the plan he had already given. Shortly before his death on April 27 this year gave Richardson the image of a four-storey castle in the made popular by him Romanesque Revival style and allowed explicitly, Herkomer could change it at will.
According to this draft Herkomer was the house in order, the named he died after his second wife Lulu the end of 1885. It was Richardson's only building in Europe. The interior was furnished partly in the Gothic Revival style, which was the father and the uncle of life especially promised, but also with elements that echo the art nouveau style. The villa was of a very high technical standard, such as with hot and cold water in all bedrooms and electricity from our own generator, and provided space for a gallery area, Herlomer private studio and work spaces. Integrates were an art school as well as stage and film studios; the productions of this theater also influenced the later stage performances by Edward Gordon Craig.
- Lululaund ~ 1900
Lobby.
Human sympathy ( frieze in the dining room).
Dancing. Oil and silk voile.
The builder of my house.
Of the inhabitants Busheys the house was often called Bavarian castle [ Bavarian castle ], but it had been very pleased with the presence of the artist to Herlomer lifetime: the art school founded by him in 1883 had greatly to the prosperity of previously rural, sleepy town in the contributed close to London.
1939, at the beginning of World War II, however, the mood was different. Officially due to unreasonable operating costs, but certainly also because of general anti- German sentiment in the country, the majority of the building was demolished. Only a part of the portal and the entrance area remained and today is an assembly hall of the British Legion.