Vernon Lushington Thomas Hughes, and Richard Buckley Litchfield, became a unifying force at the College. He was a friend to artists, authors and activists, particularly those of The Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood and the Arts and Crafts Movement who gravitated to the Working Men's College. In 1856, it was he who first introduced Edward Burne-Jones to Dante Gabriel Rossetti in his college rooms. Rossetti used Lushington’s wife, Jane, as a model in 1865. Lushington, friend of William Morris, was a frequent visitor to Kelmscott Manor. He was a close friend of Leslie Stephen and his family; Stephen’s daughter Virginia (later Woolf) based her character
Frances Horner Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood, she became known to the artists Dante Gabriel Rossetti and Edward Burne-Jones. Although married, Burne-Jones became besotted with Frances, and painted her likeness in several works. In 1869, when Frances was 15, he drew her as "The Lady of the Window" in the Vita Nuova. She was included in "The Golden Stairs" in 1880, carrying cymbals at the bottom of the stairs. She has been described as the one of the most important women his life, after his wife, his daughter and his mistress Maria Zambaco. In 1883, she married the barrister John Francis Fortescue Horner (1842–1927). His