Before Mason Croft became the Shakespeare Institute, it was home to one of Edwardian England's most flamboyant literary celebrities — this quietly striking monochrome postcard shows the ivy-draped Georgian townhouse in Stratford-upon-Avon as the residence of Marie Corelli, the phenomenally popular and fiercely eccentric novelist who outsold even Dickens in the 1890s. The three-storey stone façade is almost entirely consumed by climbing ivy, its tall sash windows peering through the leaves like eyes; a small nameplate reading "Mason Croft" is just legible beside the front door. Published by Harvey Barton & Son, Ltd. of Bristol and printed in their distinctive red-ink format, the card pre-dates the divided back (post-1902) and represents a very early topographical record of Corelli's famous Stratford home, to which she moved in 1901 and where she lived until her death in 1924. The card is unused and unaddressed.