History of Kilburn and West Hampstead

The American artist and sculptor Gutzon Borglum lived and worked at Harlestone Villa in Mortimer Road, Kilburn from about 1897 to 1902. The house was later renumbered as No.6 Mortimer Place but was damaged in 1944 by the V1 flying bomb which destroyed North Hall, the house next door. Both were demolished and today the site is covered by Halliwell House on the Kilburn Gate estate.  While at Harlestone Villa Borglum painted murals for private homes, but he is best known as the sculptor who produced the giant heads of US presidents carved into the summit of Mount Rushmore in South Dakota. Born in a frontier town in Idaho in 1867, Borglum was of Danish extraction. His father was a Mormon with two wives who were sisters. Borglum ran away from home to study art in California, and at the Julien Academy and the Ecole des Beaux Artes in Paris where he was influenced by Rodin. He arrived in London in 1896 and rented a studio in West Kensington before moving to Kilburn. Although gaining recog...