Ellen Willmott grew a collection of Epimedium in her garden at Warley Place, and commissioned paintings of them, which passed into the hands of William Stearn, who recognised this as a previously unknown hybrid and named it after the garden in 1932. I believe that this is the original hybrid, the original clone has been named E. x warleyense 'Willmottiae', but modern growers tend to disregard these small details, usually in favour of something bigger, newer and more Chinese!
