Sketches

Wallace Hester pencil drawing of the Quad at Cranleigh

A number of sketches and paintings of the School have been produced for sale over the years, perhaps the most impressive coming between the wars. In the 1930s the School commissioned Anthony Hall to produce four views; these sold well and still appear for sale from time to time on the internet.  A decade earlier, the OC Society engaged Wallace Hester, a well-known artist and engraver who contributed caricatures to Vanity Fair, to do the same. Hester had a lucrative sideline in producing sketches of famous schools – in a few years before his death in 1926 he did work for Westminster, Radley, Repton, Tonbridge and Westminster – and it appears the OCs did not want to miss out.  Hester came up with two etchings – one of the Quad and another of the front of the School – and these were sold as limited-edition signed prints for a guinea (£1.05) or as a signed proof for 10/6 (52.5p) with framing 7/- (35p) extra.