William Richard Lethaby

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Lethaby, W. R. ( William Richard Lethaby) (1857–1931). British architect, designer, writer, and teacher. He was an architect by training, but he designed few buildings, and after the turn of the century he was active mainly as a teacher and writer. From 1894 to 1918 he was art adviser to the London County Council. In this role he helped to found the Central School of Arts and Crafts (see ST MARTIN'S SCHOOL OF ART) in 1896, and he was its principal from 1902 to 1911, introducing ‘a programme of workshop training with all the latest equipment to make it one of the most progressive European art schools of its day’ ( Dennis Farr, English Art 1870–1940, 1978). From 1901 to 1918 he was also professor of design at the Royal College of Art. Lethaby was an outstanding teacher, possessing a clear mind and an enthusiastic manner. He argued that art and architecture should be socially responsible and governed by reason. His books include Medieval Art (1904), Form in Civilisation: Collected Papers on Art and Labour (1922), which Farr describes as containing ‘much practical common sense expressed in an enviably crisp, rigorous manner', and two books on the architecture of Westminster Abbey (1906 and 1925) that are still considered standard works. He was surveyor to the Abbey from 1906 to 1927 and instituted a sensitive programme of conservation of the medieval fabric, halting the tide of 19th-century ‘restoration'.

William Richard Lethaby , 1857–1931, English architect. He was a founder and first principal (1893–1911) of the London County Council Central School of Arts and Crafts, and professor of design at the Royal College of Art. He was also an influential writer on architectural subjects. Besides his important books Greek Buildings (1908), Mediaeval Art (1912), and Architecture (1912), he contributed to many periodicals.

Bibliography: See his Form in Civilization (with foreword by L. Mumford, 1957).