Robert Smirke (architect)

Sir Robert Smirke
Born	Robert Smirke 1 October 1780(1780-10-01) London
Died	18 April 1867(1867-04-18) Cheltenham, Gloucestershire
Nationality	English
Awards	Royal Gold Medal (1853)
Work
Buildings	The British Museum

Sir Robert Smirke (1780–1867) was an English architect, one of the leaders of Greek Revival architecture, though he also designed using other architectural styles. Smirke designed the main block and facade of the British Museum, perhaps his best-known work.

Biography

Smirke was born in London on 1 October 1780, the second son of portrait painter Robert Smirke he was one of twelve children. He attended Aspley School, Aspley Guise, Bedfordshire, where he studied Latin, Greek, French and drawing he was made head boy at age 15, and studied architecture as a pupil of classical architect John Soane from May 1796 but left after a few months in early 1797 due to a personality clash with Soane. He wrote the following letter to his father:

The main block and facade of the British Museum was designed by Robert Smirke.

He (Soane) was on Monday morning in one of his amiable Tempers. Everything was slovenly that I was doing. My drawing was slovenly because it was too great a scale, my scale, also, being too long, and he finished saying the whole of it was excessively slovenly, and that I should draw it out again on the back not to waste another sheet about it.

In 1796 he began his studies at the Royal Academy winning the Silver Medal that year, also winning the same year the Silver Palette of the Royal Society for the encouragement of Arts, Manufactures & Commerce, he was awarded the Gold Medal of the Royal Academy in 1799 for his design for a National Museum. After leaving Soane he depended on George Dance the Younger and a surveyor called Thomas Bush for his training. From 1801 to 1805 he embarked on the Grand Tour, he studied architecture in southern Europe. Accompanied by his elder brother Richard, his itinerary can be followed by the series of letters he wrote, Brussels, as Britain was at war, in order to visit Paris they disguised themselves as Americans, Berlin, Potsdam, Prague, Dresden, Vienna. Visiting Italy, including, Florence, Venice, Padua, Genoa, Vicenza, Rome, Naples, and Sicily then on to Greece, visiting Corinth, Athens, Delphi, Thebes and Olympia.He wrote from Athens to his father:

How can I by description give you any idea of the great pleasure I enjoyed in the sight of these ancient buildings of Athens! How strongly were exemplified in them the grandeur and effect of simplicity in architecture! The Temple of Thesus (Temple of Hephaestus)... cannot but arrest the attention of everyone from its appropriate and dignified solemnity of appearance. The temple of Minerva (Parthenon)... strikes one in the same way with its grandeur and majesty. We were a month there. The impression made upon my mind... had not in that time in the least weakened by being frequently repeated and I could with pleasure spend a much longer time there, while those in Rome (with few exceptions) not only soon grow in some degree uninteresting but have now entirely sunk into disregard and contempt in my mind. All that I could do in Athens was to make some views of them...hoping that they will serve as a memorandum to me of what I think should always be a model.'

He drew most of the ancient buildings in Morea. In 1805 he joined the Society of Antiquaries of London and the Architects' Club. In 1806 he published the first and only volume of an intended series of books Specimens of Continental Architecture.

Smirke's first official appointment came in 1807 when he was made architect to the Royal Mint. He was elected a A.R.A. (Associate of the Royal Academy) on 7 November 1808, an R.A. (Royal Academician) on 11 February 1811, his diploma work consisting of a drawing of a reconstruction of the Acropolis of Athens.

Smirke's relations with Soane reached a low point after Soane who had been appointed Professor of Architecture at the Royal Academy delivered his 4th lecture on 29 January 1810 in which he heavily criticised Smirke's design of the Covent Garden Opera House. The offending passage was:

The practise of sacrificing everything to one front of a building is to be seen, not only in small houses where economy might in some degree apologize for the absurdity, but it is also apparent in large works of great expense ..... And these drawings of a more recent work (here two drawings of Covent Garden theatre were displayed) point out the glaring impropriety of this defect in a manner if possible still more forcible and more subversive of true taste. The public attention, from the largeness of the building, being particularly called to the contemplation of this national edifice

Together with John Nash and Sir John Soane, he became an official architect to the Office of Works in 1813, thereby reaching the height of the profession. In 1819 he was made surveyor of the Inner Temple. In 1819 he married Laura Freston, daughter of The Reverend Anthony Freston the great-nephew of the architect Matthew Brettingham. The only child of the marriage was a daughter Laura. In 1820 he was made surveyor of the Duchy of Lancaster. He was knighted in 1832, and received the RIBA Royal Gold Medal for Architecture in 1853. Smirke lived at 81 Charlotte Street, London. A blue plaque commemorating his residence is on the outside of the building. He retired from practise in 1845, after which Robert Peel made him a member of the Commission for London Improvements. .In 1859 he resigned from the Royal Academy and retired to Cheltenham, living in Montpellier House, Suffolk Square, where he died on 18 April 1867, he is buried in the churchyard at St Peter's Church, Leckhampton. His estate was worth £90,000. He is known to have designed or remodelled over twenty churches, more than fifty public buildings and more than sixty private houses. This lead to James Planché's 1846 chorus in his burlesque of Aristophanes The Birds:

Go to work, rival Smirke
Make a dash, À la Nash
Something try at, worthy Wyatt
Plans out carry, great as Barry

The rapid rise of Smirke is down to political patronage. He was a Tory at a time when this party was in the ascendant. His friends at the Royal Academy such as Sir Thomas Lawrence, George Dance, Benjamin West and Joseph Farington were able to introduce him to patrons such as: John Hamilton, 1st Marquess of Abercorn; Henry Dundas, 1st Viscount Melville; Sir George Beaumont, 7th Baronet; George Hamilton-Gordon, 4th Earl of Aberdeen; Francis Seymour-Conway, 3rd Marquess of Hertford; Henry Bathurst, 3rd Earl Bathurst; John 'Mad Jack' Fuller and William Lowther, 2nd Earl of Lonsdale. These politicians and aristocrats ensured both rapid advancement and several were to commission buildings from Smirke.

Smirke was a pioneer of using both concrete and cast iron. Examples of his buildings in which he used concrete foundations include: Millbank Penitentiary, the rebuilding of the London Custom House and the British Museum. Also he used large cast iron beams to support the floors of the upper galleries at the British Museum, these had to span 41 feet. A critic writing in 1828 in The Athenaeum stated "Mr. Smirke, is pre-eminent in construction: in this respect he has not his superior in the United Kingdom". James Fergusson writing in 1849 said "He was a first class builder architect, ....no building of his ever showed a flaw or failing and ....he was often called upon to remedy the defects of his brother artist."

Smirke started to write a treatise on architecture c. 1815 and although he worked on it for about 10 years never completed it. In it he made his admiration for the architecture of ancient Greece plain. He described it as "the noblest", "simple, grand, magnificent", "with its other merits it has a kind of primal simplicity". This he contrasted with the Architecture of ancient Rome which he described as "corrupt Roman taste", "An excess of ornament is in all cases a sympton [Sic] of a vulgar or degenerate taste". Of Gothic architecture he described as '"till its despicable remains were almost everywhere superseded by that singular and mysterious compound of styles".

His pupils included his brother Sydney as well as Lewis Vulliamy, William Burn, Charles Robert Cockerell, Henry Jones Underwood and Henry Roberts.

His brothers were also notable – Sydney Smirke was also an architect, best known for the circular reading room at the British Museum, and Edward Smirke was a lawyer and antiquarian.

London buildings

Smirke designed neoclassical public buildings, among the most famous still standing in London:

• The former Royal Mint, Tower Hill (1807–12). The main building was designed by the previous architect to the Mint James Johnson, but the design was modified by Smirke who oversaw its execution. The long stone facade with a ground floor of channelled rustication, the two upper floors have a broad pediment containing The Royal Arms supported by six Roman Doric attached columns. The end bays are marked by four Doric pilasters, the Greek Doric frieze and lodges are probably be Smirke. The building contained an apartment for the Deputy Master of the Mint, The Assay Master, and Provost of the Moneyers as well as bullion stores and Mint Office.
• Lansdowne House, (1816–19) interiors, notably the sculpture gallery, central part of room has a shallow barrel vault with plain coffering, antae mark off the part circular ends of the room.
• The main block and facade of the British Museum, Bloomsbury (1823–46). This is Smirke's largest and best known building. In 1820 in his role as architect to the Office of Works Smirke was invited to redesign the museum, although the complete design dates from 1823, and was for a building surrounding a large central courtyard with a grand south front, given the limited funds the work was divided into phases. It is built of brick with the visible facades cased in Portland stone. The first part constructed was the "King's Library" of 1823-8, which forms the east wing. The north section of the west wing, the "Egyptian Galleries" followed 1825-34. The north wing, housing the library and reading rooms, was built in 1833-38. The west wing and south front were built in 1842-46. The main feature of the south front is the great colonnade of forty-four Greek Ionic columns. The columns are forty-five feet high and five feet in diameter, their capitals are loosely based on those of the temple of Athena Polias at Priene; the bases on those of the temple of Dionysus at Teos. At the centre of the colonnade is a octastyle portico, two columns deep; the colonnade continues for three more columns before embracing the two wings to either side. Beyond the facade are two smaller wings, with Doric pilasters, containing houses, the western one for the Director of the museum. The major surviving interiors are the entrance hall with the Great Stair – in the form of an Imperial staircase– rising to the west, and the "King's Library". This, built to house 65,000 books, is 300 feet long, 41 feet wide and 31 feet high, the centre section being slightly wider, with four great granite Corinthian columns. There are two levels of glazed bookcases surrounding the wall, the upper gallery having a brass handrail, with windows above on the west and east wall. The only major interior to survive in the north wing is the "Arched Room" at the west end. The "Egyptian Gallery" matches the "King's Library" but is far plainer in decoration.

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  The British Museum 1852

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  The entrance portico, The British Museum

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  Plan of British Museum

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  Great Staircase, The British Museum

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  King's Library The British Museum

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  Bookcases in the King's Library, The British Museum

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  Egyptian Gallery, The British Museum

Canada House

• The Royal College of Physicians and Union Club building in Trafalgar Square (now known as Canada House) (1824–27). The building is much altered, the north front preserves Smirke's hexastyle Ionic portico, the east front (to Trafalgar Square) preserves his portico in antis. The building is of Bath Stone. There have been several extensions and remodellings in 1924-25 from which the best interiors date, 1965–67 and 1997-98.

Former London Custom House, Thames front

• The former London Custom House, City of London, (1825–27), rebuilt the centre of the building following the failure of the foundations of the building erected from 1813 to the designs of David Laing. The building is 488 feet long, the central 200 feet being Smirke's work, this is three floors high plus a basement, the south Thames front, is of Portland stone has a hexastyle Ionic portico, the north front is brick with Portland stone dressings including the eight Doric pilasters above the entrance, his is the entrance hall, this has side walls of three arches that lead to flanking staircase, and to the south the Long Room this is 190 feet long by 29 feet wide rising to a barrel vaulted ceiling has large coffers and is 24 feet high, the walls are surrounded by Doric pilasters.
• Lancaster House first involved with the design of the building in 1825, dismissed then brought back in 1832, he added the top floor, and designed the interiors apart from the State Rooms, Smirke's involvement ceased in 1840.
• The east wing of Somerset House, and the adjacent King's (formerly Smirke) Building of King's College London, on the Strand (1829–31). The Thames front follows the design of the original architect Sir William Chambers being a mirror image of the west wing, the building stretches back toward the Strand by twenty-five bays of two and half stories, the centre five bays with giant attached Corinthian columns and end three bays are of three full stories and also the end bays have Corinthian pilasters, and general being plainer than the facades by Chambers.

The Oxford and Cambridge Club

• The Oxford and Cambridge Club building in Pall Mall (1835–38). It is of seven bays, the ground floor is rusticated with round headed windows, the first floor is of banded rustication and the windows framed with square or half pillars, the building is of brick covered with stucco. The first floor windows have carved relieves above them, the entrance porch is of a single storey with Corinthian columns. The interiors are in Smirke's usual restrained Greek revival style.
• St Mary's, Bryanston Square, a Church of England church built in 1823-4.

Of those no longer extant, he also designed:

• the second incarnation of the Covent Garden Theatre, now the Royal Opera House (1808-9, but destroyed by fire in 1857). The building took ten months to build, it covered 218 feet north to south and 166 feet east to west, the entrance facade on Bow Street was 50 feet in height. Symmetrical with a Greek Doric tetrastyle portico in the centre, raised on a podium of three steps the columns were 30 feet high, this was the first use of the Greek Doric order in London. The portico was flanked by four bays, the end bays being flanked by pilasters with a statue in a niche between. The three bays each side of the portico had arches on the ground floor and windows above these and a single carved relief above designed by John Flaxman. The main entrance hall, behind the three doors in the portico, was divided into three aisles by square Doric piers. To the south was the grand staircase, rising between walls, the flight was divided into two sections by a landing, the upper floor had four Ionic columns each side of the staircase that supported a barrel vault over it. The horseshoe shaped auditorium was on five levels, and seated 2,800 people, (not including the many private boxes).

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  Covent Garden Theatre, burnt and rebuilt

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  Covent Garden Theatre, burnt and rebuilt

Millbank Prison

• Millbank Prison (1812–21) demolished c.1890. The prison was designed by an architect called William Williams but his plan was revised by Thomas Hardwick. It was the largest prison in Europe, it consisted of a hexagonal central courtyard with an elongated pentagonal courtyard on each outer wall of the central courtyard, the three outer corners of the pentagonal courtyards had a tower one storey higher than the three floors of the rest of the building. Work started in late 1812 but the boundary wall was beginning to tilt and crack when it was six feet high. After 18 months and £26,000 there was little to show for it, Hardwick resigned. Work continued and by February 1816 the first prisoners were admitted, but the building would creek and several windows spontaneously shattered. Smirke and the engineer John Rennie the Elder were called in, they recommended demolition of three of the towers and the underpinning with concrete foundations (the first known use of this material for foundations in Britain since the Roman Empire), of the entire structure at the cost of £70,000, this brought the total cost of the building to £458,000.
• London Ophthalmic Hospital, Moorfields (1821–22) rebuilt in 1898 on a near by site, now known as Moorfields Eye Hospital NHS Foundation Trust.
• the Inner Temple, various works in Gothic (uniquely for his London buildings) including the Inner Temple Library (1827-8) and the remodelling of the Great Hall in 1819(this burnt down and was rebuilt by Sydney Smirke in 1868), nearly all Smirke's work was destroyed in the London blitz in 1940-1 and has been rebuilt to a completely different design, his only major surviving building is Paper Buildings of 1838, that is in a simple classical style.

The General Post Office, demolished

• the General Post Office building in St Martins-le-Grand in the City of London (1825–29, but demolished c. 1912). This was England's first purpose built post office. The building's main facade had a central hexastyle Greek Ionic portico with pediment, and two tetra style porticoes without pediments at each end. The main interior was the large letter-carriers room, with its elegant iron gallery and spiral staircase.

• Carlton Club (1833-6) rebuilt 1854-6 by Sydney Smirke, bombed in 1940 and later demolished.

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  Lancaster House

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  The Inner Temple Library

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  King's College London, east wing of Somerset House

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  Paper Buildings, Inner Temple

Public buildings outside London

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  Eden Bridge Carlisle

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  Perth Sheriff Court

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  Courts Lincoln Castle

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  Wellington Testimonial

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  Old Council House, Bristol

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  Former Shrewsbury Infirmary

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  Former County Courts, Carlisle

His public buildings outside London include:

• Carlisle, Cumberland County Courts (1810–12), in a Gothic style.
• Appleby Market House (1811).
• Carlisle, The Eden Bridge (1812–15) widened in 1932.
• Whitehaven Fish Market (1813) demolished c. 1852, also Butter Market (1813) demolished 1880.
• Gloucester Shire Hall (1814–16).
• Gloucester, Westgate Bridge (1814–17)
• Perth Sheriff Court House (1815–19).
• Hereford Shire Hall (1815–17).
• the Wellington Monument, Dublin (Wellington Testimonial), started in 1817 it was only completed in 1861, at 203 feet it is the largest Obelisk in Europe.
• Maidstone County Gaol, (1817–19).
• Ledbury St. Katherine's Hospital (1822–25) in a Gothic style.
• Lincoln County Courts and Gaol in Lincoln Castle (1823–30) both in a Gothic style to harmonise with the castle.
• the Old Council House, Bristol (1824–27).
• the Sessions House Maidstone, (1826–27).
• Shrewsbury Infirmary (1827–30).
• the Gaol St. John's, Newfoundland and Labrador (c. 1831).
• Shrewsbury Shire Hall (1834–37) demolished 1971.

Domestic architecture

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  Luton Hoo

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  Whittingehame House

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  Normanby Hall

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  Lowther Castle

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  Lowther Castle

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  Cholmondeley Castle

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  Eastnor Castle

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  Oulton Hall

In the classical style:

• Cirencester House north wing (1810–11) and rebuilt east front 1830.
• alterations to Luton Hoo, Bedfordshire from 1816, damaged by fire in 1843 it was reconstructed by Sydney Smirke.
• Whittingehame House, East Lothian (1817–18).
• Hardwicke Court, near Gloucester (1817–19).
• Oulton Hall (c. 1822) damaged by fire 1850 and restored by Sydney Smirke
• Normanby Hall (1825–30)

Smirke used the Elizabethan Style at:

• Drayton Manor (1831–35) demolished 1919.

His Gothic Revival domestic buildings include:

• Lowther Castle in Cumbria, (in 1806–11) his first major commission when he was 26.
• Wilton Castle (Yorkshire) (1810)
• Cholmondeley Castle (1817–19) a remodelling of the existing building.
• Kinfauns Castle, Perthshire (1822–26)

A rare use of Norman Revival Architecture is:

• Eastnor Castle, Ledbury, Herefordshire (1812–20)

Church architecture

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  St Anne's Wandsworth

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  St Anne's Wandsworth

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  St Mary's Bryanston Square

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  St. Mary's Church, Bryanston Square

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  St Philip's Church, Salford

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  St George, Brandon Hill

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  St George Tyldesley

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  The Mausoleum Milton

He advised the Parliamentary Commissioners on the building of new churches from 1818 onwards, contributing seven himself, six were in the Greek revival style, the exception being the church at Tyldesley that is in the Gothic revival style:

• St Anne's Wandsworth (1820–22).
• St John's Chatham, Kent (1821–22).
• St James West Hackney (1821-3) bombed during The Blitz in 1940 & 1941 and later demolished.
• St George, Brandon Hill in Bristol (1821–23).
• St George, Tyldesley (1821-4).
• St Mary's, Bryanston Square (1821-3).
• St. Philip's Salford, Greater Manchester (1822-4) this is a copy of St Mary's with only minor variations.

Smirke also designed churches for clients other than the commissioners, these included:

• Belgrave Chapel London 1812, demolished c. 1910.
• St Nicholas Strood, this was a rebuilding in 1812 of a medieval church, the tower of which has been retained, and is in a simplified classical style.
• the Milton Mausoleum at Milton, Nottinghamshire (1831–32) for Henry Pelham-Clinton, 4th Duke of Newcastle.
• The parish church at Askham, Cumbria 1832, in a Tudor gothic style.

Restoration work

Smirke was involved in Building restoration, several commissions coming to him via his official post in the Office of Works:

• Gloucester Cathedral (1807), Gothic screen behind the high altar removed 1873.
• Carlisle Cathedral (1809–11), repairs and alterations to the Fratry.
• Savoy Chapel (1820–21), rebuilt south wall and added the west tower.
• Bodleian Library, Oxford (1830) repaired the roof and inserted a new ceiling in the upper reading room in the schools quadrangle.
• Clarendon Building, Oxford (1831) fitted up the interior as university offices.
• York Minster after the arson attack on the chancel of the cathedral in 1829, Smirke oversaw the restoration (1830–32), which involved rebuilding the roof and vaults plus the recreation of the choir stalls
• Palace of Westminster, (1834–37) he refaced the interior of Westminster Hall after the fire of 1834 and erected a temporary House of Lords within it.
• Banqueting House, Whitehall (1835–38) repairs and internal alterations.
• Mansion House, London (1836), redesign of the external steps to the portico.
• St. James's Palace (1836–37) refitted the interior of the Chapel Royal.
• Serjeant's Inn (1836–39) extensive reconstruction work, destroyed 1940 during the London Blitz.

Further reading

• Colvin, H.M. (1997). A Biographical Dictionary of British Architects, 1600-1840. New Haven: Yale University Press. p. not cited. ISBN 0-300-07207-4. 

External links

• Smirke's work in Cumbria
• Eastnor Castle, designed by Robert Smirke