We heard from friends the very sad news of the death
of "Bill Hornets" (William Wilde).
Bill had dinner once in our house when he was
visiting Tommy Page in Amsterdam.
Bill The
Guv'nor was an important figure and character in London daily life.
He played a very important role in the Vintage
London scene offering the highest quality of clothing for men. He has always refused
the concept and phenomenon of Vintage saying always that he was a Secondhand
clothes dealer and seller.
He was the proud owner of three fabulous little
shops in Kensington.
He always remains in our memory and will never be
forgotten by us.
Adieu Bill. May your soul rest in peace and that
you will find the light that you always aspired with your continuous search for
quality.
Sérgio and Trudie.
"Bill Hornets" (William Wilde) was a
well-known figure in Kensington's vintage scene, noted for his three stores on
Kensington Church Street and Church Walk, specializing in classic men's style.
While an Instagram post in April 2025 by Hornets
Kensington announced the sad death of a team member named Chris Bannon (signed
by #billhornets), Bill Wilde himself was still actively linked to the business
in a Standard article from September 2025.
Known in the
vintage-clothes business as “Bill Hornets,” William Hornets Wilde is one of
those English gentlemen whom visitors to London imagine the city must be filled
with. It isn’t, of course, which is what makes Mr. Wilde and his shops so
special.
He owns three stores
in the Kensington area: two for vintage suits, hats and shoes, and a third for
seasonal wear—whether that’s tweeds for the shooting season, tails for Ascot or
any other esoteric formal-outing requirements.
Although Mr. Wilde
won’t mention names (“I never recognize anybody,” he said), his extensive
inventory has made loyal customers out of designers like Ralph Laure and Tom
Ford.
Mostly, though, Mr.
Wilde caters to country gentlemen, aristocrats, royal cousins, university
students—patrons who prefer to avoid the expense and formality of Jermyn Street
and the fickleness of the fashion industry.
Anyone in the market
for say, a bespoke 1960s Anderson & Sheppard kid mohair suit, a vintage
alligator-skin suitcase or a ’30s chocolate-brown smoking jacket are well
advised to drop in.
Mr. Wilde, who was
also a TV actor in the ’60s and ’70s (now best remembered for his part in
“Blood Beast Terror” from the British film studio Hammer), maintains a network
of buyers throughout southern England who forage for treasures at estate sales
and flea markets.
In-store, Mr. Wilde helps customers with questions of
sartorial refinement, promoting his modus operandi (proudly displayed on the
Hornets website: “Not Fashion. Style.”
One should never
follow fashion for fashion’s sake. With classic style you stand out from the
crowd, with fashion you become one of the crowd.
The best pair of
shoes I own are brown brogues from George Cleverley.
The great figures of
style are the Duke of Windsor, Cary Grant, the present Prince of Wales.
I prefer French cuffs
and straight collars.
A bow tie can be worn
in day time with a jacket or three-piece suit.
The lady on your arm can be extravagant and colorful. You
have to be quietly masculine. At Ascot, a morning suit is very simple, but a
lady can be fairly outrageous with her hat. A man has to be simple in his
dress.
I wish men wouldn’t
tie a hangman’s knot in their scarves, nor wear beanie hats, trainers or
colorful silk waistcoats with morning suits. There are more offenses, but they
are too terrible to mention.
My favorite suit was
a three-piece chalk-stripe Huntsman. It fit me so beautifully, as if I were
poured into it. The pants were cut very high, military style. The waistcoat had
small lapels. As I am tall and was slim in those days, it looked fantastic.
My favorite style of
men’s dress is English country clothing: shooting jackets, tweed suits,
moleskins and cords.
My favorite warm
weather vacation is on the English Riviera: Dorset, Devon and Cornwall.
I prefer a dry
martini shaken, not stirred, at the St. James Hotel in London.
The single piece of
clothing I’ve had the longest is a ’30s double- breasted tan-colored leather
motoring coat.
My favorite album of
all time is Billie Holiday “Lady in Satin.”
I’ve just got into
Agatha Christie’s “Murder on the Orient Express.”
In the morning I love
half a cold game bird from the night before, black coffee and the Times. Then I
read and send some emails.
My favorite hotel is
the Grande Bretagne in Athens. Many happy memories.
Laurence
Fellows (1885–1964) was a pioneering illustrator whose work in the 1930s and
1940s was crucial in defining modern male fashion illustration, particularly
through his contributions to Apparel Arts (the precursor to GQ) and Esquire.
His illustrations were essential for shifting men's fashion away from
simplistic advertising toward a sophisticated, detailed, and aspirational
aesthetic that portrayed men as stylish, affluent, and at ease.
Importance
of Fellows' Work:
Detailed
Fabric and Texture Representation: Fellows was renowned for his ability to
expertly depict the weight, texture, and drape of fabrics, including flannels,
worsteds, tweeds, and linens, making the clothing the "star" of the
image.
Creating
"Casual Elegance": His art captured a specific, relaxed masculinity,
showing men in comfortable, well-tailored clothes that were both refined and
unstudied, setting a standard for "casual elegance".
Influencing
Lifestyle Imagery: Instead of using underfed models, Fellows portrayed mature,
dapper men in realistic, opulent settings—such as hosting parties, traveling,
or at clubs—making the depicted lifestyle and fashion aspirational and
accessible to readers.
Bridging
Style and Fashion: During a time when many men had limited wardrobes, Fellows'
work helped transform the focus from fast-changing trends to lasting personal
style, highlighting the importance of well-fitting, classic pieces.
Enduring
Legacy: His contributions were so significant that his 1930s illustrations
remain a key reference for vintage menswear, with his work influencing
contemporary interest in suits, tweed, and tailored looks. He was posthumously
inducted into the Society of Illustrators Hall of Fame in 2009.
Fellows'
work was particularly vital because of the limited supply of male fashion
artists at the time, making his distinct style a dominant force in shaping how
men's fashion was visualized and marketed during that era.
This is the only photograph I was able to find in my search in the Internet ...namely a group Photo of Young American Artists ( Wikipedia).The "blow up" of Laurence Fellows was made by the "blogger" Maxminimus, in Maxminimus.blogspot. Young American Artists of the Modern School, L. to R. Jo Davidson, Edward Steichen, Arthur B. Carles, John Marin; back: Marsden Hartley, Laurence Fellows, c. 1911, Bates College Museum of Art
(1885 - 1964) From the Gay Nineties up through the 1920s, American humor magazines played a greater social role than is generally appreciated. Their candor in recording the current events in a satirical weekly or monthly forum presented the contemporary American attitudes, prejudices, and mores in the guise of humor that was not found in the more sober mainstream periodicals. Publications such as Truth, Life, Puck, Leslie's, and Judge showcased the talents of such major illustrators as Charles Dana Gibson, James Montgomery Flagg, Orson Lowell, T.S. Sullivant, Peter Newell, Art Young, and many others who mirrored the country's foibles in their enthusiastic ridicule.
Joining the group in the early teens was an ultra sophisticated young artist named Laurence Fellows. A native of Pennsylvania, Fellows had received his training at the Philadelphia Academy of Art, with several follow-up years studying in England and in France at the Academie Julien under J.P. Laurens.
Upon his return to the United States, Fellows' fresh point of view, particularly reflecting a French/Vogue influence, found him a ready audience. His style was distinguished by a thin outline, flat tonality or color, with the emphasis on shapes rather than details. Just as quickly, however, he acquired many imitators. Before John Held, Jr., for instance, had invented his "flapper," he was clearly adapting much from Fellows' mannered drawing style into his own submitted gags. Other new converts were Hal Burroughs, Bertram Hartman, and Ralph Barton, who would each run with it in their own way. Fellows particularly liked to play with off-balanced compositions, even in the more conservative arena of illustration for advertising.
One of his early commercial clients was Kelly-Springfield Tires, which gave him the opportunity to combine his elegant draftsmanship with the clever, humorous copy depreciating the competition, thus often violating the rule against "negative" advertising. But Fellows' drawing and the copy had an edge of good humor that attracted a national following and the successful campaign lasted for many years.
In the thirties, Fellows gradually shifted his emphasis to fashion art, including both men and women, finding clients in Vanity Fair, Vogue, Cosmopolitan, The American Magazine, and McClure's. He also became a regular contributor to Apparel Arts magazine.
With only a limited number of men's fashion artists available, Fellows was most in demand for the male-focused subjects, particularly by the newly launched Esquire magazine in the thirties, where he was regularly featured in full-color spreads for many years.
Although Fellows considered himself a commercial illustrator, he was also a painter who exhibited periodically, later concentrating on abstractions. In reviewing his entire career, however, it is his early work, when he found a fresh viewpoint in a sophisticated spoof of the social upper crust, that makes us admire his audacity and leaves us with a smile of appreciation.
Walt Reed
"Fellows was born in Ardmore, Pennsylvania in 1885. He was trained in illustration at the Pennsylvania Academy of Art, and honed his trademark “continental” style studying in England and France. But the real story begins when he returned to the States in the early 1910s and burst on the scene as an eager and talented young artist. Fellows found work contributing to satirical magazines like Life and Leslie’s, and his European-influenced style was fresh and new, reflecting the sleekness and stylization that led to Art Deco. His work was so fresh, in fact, that he found many of his better-known contemporaries, including John Held, Jr. and Ralph Barton, were adapting his stylistic elements for their own use. Fellows’ style during this period was very mannered and graphic, with thin black outlines enclosing flat expanses of tone and compositions that emphasized graphic weight and balance over fussy illustrative detail. His bread and butter throughout the 1920s was his work for the Kelly-Springfield Tire company. He brought an idea to the Kelly advertising manager for a series of magazine ads featuring “smart cars and smart types of people.” It was the beginning of an assignment that lasted for nearly a decade. The ads are still smart and fashionable today (and becoming collectible, by the way). But it was in the 1930s that Fellows found the niche that would shape the lives of dandies for the next 80 years: fashion illustration. Though he contributed to Vanity Fair, McClure’s, and The American Magazine, among other publications, it was men’s fashion where he was most in demand, and Apparel Arts, aimed at the tailoring trade, and Esquire were his showcases. Fellows’ technique as a fashion illustrator was more painterly and detailed than his earlier commercial work. The man could draw fabric, plain and simple. His fabric had weight, heft, drape, texture, and sheen. His flannels, worsteds, tweeds, and linens, his barathea and velvet and twill were all fabulous. He also defined a very specific, very masculine world. Unlike today’s fashion magazines, Apparel Arts didn’t dictate fashion trends by using underfed models in unwearable suits. It showed what was already being worn by the well-heeled, trend-setting folk. Fellows’ genius as an illustrator lay in his ability to depict them in their everyday activities. Whether they were traveling the world, hosting dinner parties, hunting grouse, or just lounging around the penthouse or club, Fellows somehow made their rarified universe accessible. Ordinary folks could look at the illustrations and say, “I could wear that.” Rather than looking overdressed and stuffy, or merely human shapes on which to hang clothes, Fellows’ subjects are men for whom dressing splendidly comes naturally. They’re having a good time, smiling, and enjoying themselves in their relaxed, party-filled sphere, and all of them are illustrations of casual, well-tailored elegance. Laurence Fellows died in 1964, and in 2009 was named to the Society of Illustrators Hall of Fame. His immortality in the world of men’s fashion is assured simply because he had the ability to illustrate real men in their real lives and make those lives ones we all want to live." — BILL THOMPSON in Dandyisme.net
Alexander
Thomson began work in 1834, as a clerk in a lawyers office in Glasgow. One of
their clients was an architect, Robert Foote, who was impressed by seeing
Thomson's drawings and took him on as an articled apprentice. He learnt a great
deal from getting access to Foote's extensive library and collection of
classical casts, but in 1836 Foote had to retire due to illness. To complete
his articles, Thomson became apprenticed to the architect John Baird, initially
as an assistant, and later became chief draughtsman. Thomson's younger brother
George got apprenticed to Baird in the early 1840s.
In
September 1847 Thomson married Jane Nicholson, and on the same day her sister
married another architect, John Baird (unrelated to Thomson's employer, and
referred to by biographers as John Baird II), who fell out with his previous
partner. In 1848 Thomson joined him in a new partnership, the practice of Baird
& Thomson.
In 1857,
as "the rising architectural star of Glasgow," he entered into
practice with his brother George where he was to enjoy the most productive
years of his life. He served as president of both the Glasgow Architectural
Society and the Glasgow Institute of Architects. Thomson was an elder of the
United Presbyterian Church of Scotland, and his deep religious convictions
informed his work. There is a strong suggestion that he closely identified
Solomon's Temple with the raised basilica of the same form of his three major
churches.
He
produced a diverse range of structures including villas, a castle, urbane
terraces, commercial warehouses, tenements, and three extraordinary churches.
Of these, Caledonia Road Church (1856–57) is now a ruin, Queen's Park United
Presbyterian Church (1869) was destroyed in WWII, and St Vincent Street Church
(1859) is the only intact survivor. Hitchcock once stated, "[Thomson has
built] three of the finest Romantic Classical churches in the world”.Thomson
developed his own highly idiosyncratic style from Greek, Egyptian and Levantine
sources and freely adapted them to the needs of the modern city.
At the
age of 34, Thomson designed his first and only castle, Craigrownie Castle,
which stands at the tip of the Rosneath Peninsula in Cove, overlooking Loch
Long. The six-storey structure is Scots Baronial in style, featuring a central
tower with battlements, steep gables and oriel windows, in addition to a chapel
and a mews cottage.
Thomson's
villa designs were realized at Langside, Pollokshields, Helensburgh, Cove, the
Clyde Estuary, and on the Isle of Bute. His "mature villas are Grecian in
style while resembling no other Greek Revival houses,...[and they] are
dominated by horizontal lines and rest on a strong podium."According to Gavin Stamp,
"Thomson carefully designed his villas with symmetries within an overall
asymmetry in a personal language in which the horizontal discipline of a
continuous governing order—whether expressed or implied—was never abandoned.[Regarding
similarities to Frank Lloyd Wright, Stamp states, "It has often been
remarked that there are clear resemblances between the early houses of the
Prairie School and Thomson's horizontally massed design, with its low-pitched
gables and spreading eaves -- together with a connecting garden." As Sir
John Summerson noted, "There is something wildly 'American' about Thomson
-- a 'New World' attitude. You can see it in the villas...a sort of
primitivism, ultra-Tuscan."
Later in
his career he would abandon his eclecticism and adopt the purely Ionic Greek
style for which he is best known, as such he is perhaps the last in a
continuous tradition of British Greek Revival architects. In attacking the
Gothic, he "insisted that 'Stonehenge is really more scientifically
constructed than York Minster'...[alluding to] Pugin's comment that in their
temples 'the Greeks erected their columns like the uprights of
Stonehenge'."[12] Other important works still standing include Moray Place,
Great Western Terrace, Egyptian Halls in Union Street, Grosvenor Building,
Buck's Head Building in Argyle Street, Grecian Buildings in Sauchiehall Street,
Walmer and Millbrae Crescents, and his villa, Holmwood House, at Cathcart.
Thomson
was a visionary who introduced into our vocabulary some of the essential
elements of sustainable housing. This argument hinges on an unrealized design
Thomson prepared in 1868 for the Glasgow City Improvement Trust, an agency of
the Town Council given the task of redeveloping a large area of slum housing
centred on the medieval Old Town. The Trust invited Thomson and five other
prominent architects to propose designs for the reconstruction of various
parcels of land along the spine of Glasgow's High Street. Thomson suggested
that closely spaced parallel tenements be built within the central courtyard,
the ends of which will be open to facilitate ventilation. He also proposed that
alternate streets be glazed for better warmth and safety for the residents.
Although Thomson's ideas failed to catch on at the time, new research and CAD
techniques have helped show how revolutionary was his proposal for improved
workers' housing.
Holmwood
House is the finest and most elaborate residential villa designed by the
Scottish architect Alexander "Greek" Thomson. It is also rare in
retaining much of its original interior decor, and being open to the public. A
Category A listed building, the villa is located at 61–63 Netherlee Road,
Cathcart, in the southern suburbs of Glasgow, and is owned by the National
Trust for Scotland.
Holmwood
is considered to be immensely influential by several architectural historians,
because the design as published in Villa and Cottage Architecture: select
examples of country and suburban residence recently erected in 1868may have influenced Frank Lloyd
Wright and other proto-modernist architects.
History
Holmwood
was constructed for James Couper, a paper manufacturer in 1857–1858. Couper and
his brother Robert owned the Millholm paper mill in the valley of the White
Water of Cart immediately below the villa. The principal rooms of Holmwood were
orientated towards the view of Cathcart Castle (demolished in 1980). The cost
of the house was £2,608:4:11d; the coach house, greenhouse & outbuildings
cost a further £1,009:19:6d; and the gates an additional £75:2:0d
The
polychromatic decoration was designed by Thomson and executed by Campbell Tait
Bowie. The most notable survival is in the dining room which has a frieze of
panels enlarged from John Flaxman's illustrations of Homer's Iliad. The
sculpture on the hall chimneypiece was by George Mossman.
Holmwood
was altered in the 1920s by the owner, James Gray. After World War II it was
purchased by a local vet, James McElhone and his family, wife Betty and
children: Rosemary, James, Helen and Paul.
In 1931,
Thomas Redden Patterson purchased the house and settled there with his wife,
Margaret Malcolm Dumbreck Forrester. Together, they established Forresters
(Outfitters) Ltd a prominent Glasgow-based firm—founded in 1955 to continue the
legacy of Margaret’s earlier business, Margaret Forrester, Drapers, which had
operated on London Road. The company remained a respected name in local retail
until its acquisition by House of Fraser Ltd in 1984.
Beyond
their entrepreneurial ventures, the Pattersons also owned a yacht moored in
Greenock, which notably took part in the Dunkirk evacuation. Thomas Patterson’s
contributions to public life in Glasgow were formally recognised in the Queen’s
Birthday Honours List of 1954 (CBE).
Holmwood
was eventually sold to the Sisters of Our Lady of the Missions who obliterated
much of the original decoration with plain paint. The gardener's cottage was
demolished in the 1970s; the grounds and those of an adjacent villa were used
for a Catholic primary school.
The nuns
put the property on the market in the early 1990s, and there was a danger that
the grounds would be developed for housing, destroying the setting of the
villa. Following an appeal, Holmwood was acquired by the National Trust for
Scotland in 1994 with the support of £1.5million from the National Heritage
Memorial Fund.[3] It was restored by Page\Park Architects in 1997–1998. Their
work included undoing the 1920s alterations and rebuilding the connecting
screen wall to the coach house. Patrick Baty carried out the paint analysis.
Villa Kerylos in Beaulieu-sur-Mer is a Greek-style property built in the early 1900s by French archaeologist Theodore Reinach, and his wife Fanny Kann, a daughter of Maximilien Kann and Betty Ephrussi, of the Ephrussi family. Madame Fanny Reinach was a cousin of Maurice Ephrussi, who was married to Béatrice de Rothschild. Inspired by the beauty of the Reinach's Villa Kerylos and the area they built the Villa Ephrussi de Rothschild at nearby Cap Ferrat.
A Greek word, "Kerylos" means Halcyon or kingfisher which in Greek mythology was considered a bird of good omen.
Reinach admired the architecture, interior decoration and art of the ancient world and decided to recreate the atmosphere of a luxurious Greek villa in a new building. He purchased land surrounded on three sides by the sea on the tip of the Baie des Fourmis at Beaulieu-sur-Mer which he felt offered a location similar to that of coastal Greek temples.
Reinach selected as architect Emmanuel Pontremoli, who drawing on this travels in Asia Minor designed a faithful reconstruction of the Greek noble houses built on the island of Delos in the 2nd century B.C. and laid out the building around a open peristyle courtyard
Construction of the building began in 1902 and took 6 years to complete. The interior integrated influences from Rome, Pompeii and Egypt with the interior decoration overseen by Gustave Louis Jaulmes and Adrian Karbowsky.Stucco bas-reliefs were created by sculptor Paul Jean-Bapiste Gascq.
Reinach commissioned exact copies of ancient Grecian chairs, tabourets and klismos furniture kept in the National Archaeological Museum in Naples from the cabinetmaker Bettenfeld. Other were to original designs by Pontremoli.
The building incorporated all the latest modern early 20th century features including plumbing and underfloor heating.
Upon his death in 1928, Reinach bequeathed the property to the Institut de France, of which he had been a member. His children and grandchildren continued to live there until 1967, when the villa was classified as a Monument historique. It is now a museum open to the public.
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