| Architect Details |
James Henderson, architect 1850; Alexander Graham Henderson, architect before 1953; James Miller and Richard McLeod Morrison Gunn, architects c.1933; Oliver Falvey Hill 1953; Law & Dunbar-Nasmith, architects 1980.
James Henderson advertised for contractors from Kildrummy from 1856 to 1859. It seems very likely that he is the James Henderson who is described in his wife's will as 'sometime architect, afterwards farmer, Towie, Aberdeenshire'. His own will makes no mention of the fact that he had been an architect but describes him as a farmer who 'resided at New Morlich, parish of Towie'. He appears to have died on 7 May 1883 and his wife, Jean Hosie, died on 9 March 1892 in Lerwick, Shetland. (Towie is adjacent to the parishes of Kildrummy and Strathdon). Nothing further is yet known of his career as an architect.
James Miller was born in 1860 in the parish of Auchtergaven where his father George Miller was a farmer. Very early in life his father moved to Little Cairnie, Forteviot, where his childhood was spent, his later school education being at Perth Academy. In 1877 he was articled to Andrew Heiton of Perth, soon to be joined in partnership with his nephew Andrew Heiton Granger (after 1894 Andrew Granger Heiton) who probably had some English experience (though probably not with Norman Shaw as stated by Sloan and Murray). At the end of his apprenticeship he spent some time with Hippolyte Jean Blanc before joining the Caledonian Railway engineering department initially at Perth under John Morrison Barr. He was transferred to the Glasgow office in 1888, where he designed a number of stations under the supervision of the engineer-in-chief, George Graham. These brought his work to the attention of the management and directors, and in 1890 an old school friend, Donald Alexander Matheson, a pupil of the Perth architect and civil engineer John Young, joined him in the office as resident engineer for the construction of the Glasgow Central Low Level lines. During his period with the Caledonian Railway Miller made at least one study tour of France, Belgium and Germany and had established a small but up-market private practice. He set up full-time practice on his own account in 1892 on winning the competition for Belmont Church and rented an office at 223 West George Street, his house and office having previously been at 3 Windsor Street. In 1894 his experience at railway work brought commissions for the stations on the West Highland Railway: Miller appears to have produced the standard design, but the actual construction and the design of some of the ancillary buildings were shared with John James Burnet and his assistant Robert Wemyss who set up practice on his own in Helensburgh in 1896. On Graham's death in 1899 Matheson took over as engineer-in-chief, and although limited competitions were to be held for some Caledonian projects, Matheson's influence ensured that all the major ones went to Miller. In 1898 Miller won the competition for the Glasgow International Exhibition of 1901; in 1901 that for the Glasgow Royal Infirmary, although the assessor, Rowand Anderson, had recommended Henry Edward Clifford; in 1903 those for the Materia Medica and Physiology buildings and Natural Philosophy Buildings at the University; and in 1904 he secured the patronage of the Glasgow & South Western Railway for its hotel at Turnberry. In 1908 he won the competition for the museum in Bombay but the commission was given to the runner-up, George Wittet. Two years later he won the competition for the Institution of Civil Engineers in Westminster and secured that for the extension of the Institution of Mechanical Engineers to match it on the opposite side of Great George Street. Miller thus came near to eclipsing Burnet in London as well as in Glasgow, but his London office at 1 Victoria Street was not reopened after the First World War. Although Miller's written memoranda as a Royal Fine Art Commissioner show him to have been extremely thoughtful in matters of design, Miller's twentieth century practice depended for its quality of detail on a series of supremely well-chosen assistants. In the earliest years of the century these included James Carruthers Walker from 1900 until at least 1911, and James Carrick, Alexander McInnes Gardner, Thomas Andrew Millar, George Arthur Boswell, Thomas Lumsden Taylor, Balfour Abercrombie and Charles Forsyth for shorter periods of two to four years. American influence is first seen in Miller's Hispanic American exhibition buildings of 1898-1901, which like their American counterparts were built of a hard white plaster known at the time as 'staff'. It became even more marked after Matheson's fact-finding visit to the USA in 1902. Although the younger Carrick believed that Miller had gone as well, his daughter confirmed that he had not and that his knowledge of American architecture came from Matheson and contemporary journals. American influence made its first appearance in permanent form in 1903 at Olympia House in Queen Street, uncompromisingly rectangular in form like contemporary American steel frame buildings with the high-level giant colonnade that became a feature of taller American office buildings in the 1890s. Turnberry Hotel, begun in the following year, and Peebles Hydropathic, begun in 1905, were similarly reflections of American country hotels, as was his competition win for the design of the Caledonian Railway's Gleneagles, but completion of that project became wholly the responsibility of the railway's architect Matthew Adam after the First World War. Nevertheless Miller's public and commercial architecture tended to remain an accomplished Glasgow neo-Baroque, with occasional experiments in faience to combat the Glasgow atmosphere from 1907 onwards. American and Canadian influence reappeared at Cranston's Cinema building in Renfield Street in 1914-15 and became even more marked after Richard M Gunn became chief assistant in 1918, most notably at the McLaren warehouse in George Square in 1922, its elevations similar to those of Warren & Wetmore's Canadian Northern Station of 1917-18 in Montreal, and at the Union Bank of Scotland in St Vincent Street won in competition in 1924 with a design inspired by York & Sawyer's 1913 Guaranty Trust Building and McKim Mead & White's National City Bank of 1903-10, both in New York. Both of these buildings had pure classical detail, but from 1930 the details became more an Egyptianised Art Deco classical with a marked preference for Portland stone as a more durable alternative to faience. A monumental English brick and stone idiom was developed in parallel from the late 1920s, the product of a commission for Cadbury's Bournville and a competition win for Wyggeston Grammar School at Leicester; and from 1929 Miller took over at Crittal's Silver End development, continuing the flat roofed modern idiom introduced there by Thomas Tait and Fred McManus. After Gunn died following a period of poor health in 1933, the main design responsibility seems to have been passed to James Carruthers Walker - who had returned - until Miller's son George Miller rejoined the office. George had been educated at Fettes College and at St John's College, Cambridge as well as in his father's office and at the Royal Technical College of Glasgow. Around 1932 he obtained a place in Sir Herbert Baker's office for experience, returning c.1936 to take a hand in the design work with Walker. The practice then became James Miller & Son. From about 1933 a symmetrical horizontally proportioned modern with oblong central pavilions was adopted in parallel with the brick modernised neo-Georgian of Gunn's last years. Miller was conservative in politics and a member of both the Conservative Club and the Junior Conservative Club as well as the Glasgow Arts Club. In their RIAS Quarterly memoir of 1948 Manson and Walker described Miller as. 'Very reserved by nature, he did not enter much into public life and was well content to let others talk architecture while he was doing the job. Quick tempered, he could also be very sympathetic and understanding when the occasion demanded. He was also a hard task-master, but few of the men who passed through his hands will deny that they benefited to a remarkable degree from being employed by Mr Miller, and many of them, now successful architects on their own account later wrote to him to this effect'. Perhaps not every Glasgow architect would have concurred with that description. The directors of the Railway companies were the most influential patrons in Glasgow. The degree to which Miller seemed to sweep up nearly every worth-while commission was resented by many while the matter of the Glasgow Royal Infirmary rankled with the assessor, Sir Rowand Anderson, and with the Glasgow architectural profession as a whole to the day he died. If, as has been remarked, he stayed out of the limelight at openings, it was because he knew his clients and knew not to step out of line. And although Miller lived relatively quietly at home, first at 19 Hillhead Street and later at Randolphfield, Stirling, which he bought in 1911, the circles in which he moved required him to entertain lavishly when the occasion demanded. His office, at 15 Blythswood Square from about 1900, was even smarter than Burnet's nearby in St Vincent Street. To their brief memoir Manson and Walker added a mysterious last paragraph: 'At one stage in his career, a famous architect made a tentative approach with a view to partnership, but after careful consideration Mr Miller decided to plough the lone furrow, and this he did most successfully to the end of his days.' The probability must be that the famous architect was John James Burnet when seeking a Glasgow partner after setting up his London office in 1904. The identity of the famous architect remained a well-kept secret as no one else who had been in their offices knew for certain to whom this referred. Miller married Emelina Henrietta Crichton around 1898. George was the only son, but there were two daughters, Mabel (Mrs Harper) and Muriel. Of life at Randolphfield Mrs Harper recalled that Miller was a gardener, doing much of the maintenance himself. He taught the children to play tennis - he laid out a court for the purpose - and golf, and took them on fishing expeditions. Gleneagles was a favourite venue, despite his disappointment there, and he had motor cars appropriate to his clientele, a Delage and a Hispano-Suiza driven by a chauffeur with the somewhat improbable surname of Mustard. Like Lorimer he had classical tastes in music and was a good violinist. Miller never troubled himself with the qualifying exam and was admitted FRIBA relatively late on 7 April 1902, his proposers being William Leiper, William Forrest Salmon, both of Glasgow, and John Slater of London. While still with the Caledonian Railway he began exhibiting at the Royal Scottish Academy as well as at the Royal Glasgow Fine Art Institute as early as 1890; but he did not begin exhibiting regularly until 1904, three years after his unsought election as ARSA in 1901. He was elected full academician in 1930, and throughout the following decade was an influential Royal Fine Art Commissioner, writing a particularly interesting report on the Office of Works designs for St Andrews House. It was a commission he did not get despite the best efforts of Lord Weir, but as a commissioner he gave Thomas Tait his full support. Miller was also one of the committee of seven for the Department of Health on matters relating to hosuing for the working classes. George Miller died in 1940. His father thereafter saw no point in continuing to practise and retired in December at the age of eighty. The practice was continued by John Wellwood Manson from George A Boswell's office under the name of Miller & Manson, Walker remaining only briefly as he too was nearing retirement. Manson had studied at Glasgow School of Art and the Royal College of Technology. He assisted the Millers with the later stages of the Commercial Bank, the BBC Buildings and other projects, and completed the work in hand. James Miller died at Randolphfield on 28 November 1947, leaving the very substantial sum of £47,931 8s 11d. Manson died on 11 October 1952. The practice was then taken over by Frank Burnet Bell & Partners who completed the few buildings then in progress. NB James Miller's library was presented to NMRS in 2004, presumably a bequest from his daughter.
Richard 'Richie' McLeod Morrison Gunn was born on 1 June 1889 in England, the son of Archibald Reid Gunn, physician and his wife Emily Parry: the painter Sir (Herbert) James Gunn was his younger brother, born 1893. Richard studied at Glasgow School of Art from the age of eleven in 1900-02. He was articled to Henry Edward Clifford in Glasgow c.1904-09, winning the Tite Prize in the latter year and spending some months in travel: Eugène Bourdon advised him to go to the USA, where he spent some time in a New York office. During this period he also studied at the Glasgow School of Architecture, from 1905 to 1910. His RIAS Quarterly obituary does not say where he spent the next year or two although W T Johnston indicates Burnet's office (probably the Glasgow one). However, he joined the office of James Miller in 1910 or 1911, and whilst assisting there he appears to have been involved in the design of Miller's Cranston's Picture House and Tea Room, which is very much in his style. He remained with Miller until he was called up for military service during the First World War. Whilst on war service he was badly gassed, resulting in poor health for the rest of his life thereafter. He re-joined Miller's office as chief assistant in 1918 and remained there until his sudden death of nephritis on 16 October 1933 at his house at 22 Clouston Street. He was survived by his wife Margaret Mary Wood Hemstock and three children. Gunn never had any interest in setting up on his own to run a small practice. Miller's connections provided the opportunities for large-scale design that were his forte and consequently Gunn never troubled himself with the qualifying exam or membership to the RIBA. In his RIAS Quarterly obituary, Miller described him as 'a brilliant and rapid draughtsman; in his design he was scholarly and refined, while his knowledge of the practical side of the profession was such as is possessed by few … He loved his work and took no end of pains with any subject he had to deal with, to achieve the best results down to the imminent detail.' Gunn was a master of American commercial classicism and his designs for Miller had a profound effect on the work of his Glasgow contemporaries. Although Miller observed of him that 'he had a quiet and lovable disposition with a keen sense of humour', James A Carrick who was in the office at the time said of them that 'although they worked so well together, there was no warmth at all between them, no relationship other than employer and employed.' Gunn left a widow, Margaret Hemstock (perhaps a relative of Albert Hodge) and three children, the eldest of whom, Gordon (b.1916) received a bursary to study architecture at the Royal Technical College but became a chartered surveyor. He became better known as a watercolourist, exhibiting in London from 1957.
Oliver Falvey Hill was born at 89 Queen's Gate, London on 15 June 1887, the seventh son of William Neave Hill, a London businessman of Aberdonian descent. He was educated at Reigate and at Uppingham. The family were friends of Lutyens, and on his advice Hill spent eighteen months in a builders' yard to gain knowledge of materials before commencing his architectural studies. This he did with J Simpson & Son, Dorset Street. In 1907 at the end of his time there, he was articled to William Flockhart rather than to Lutyens, and began studying under Hugh Patrick Guarin Maule at the Architectural Association where he became a particular friend of Philip Dalton Hepworth. Hill commenced practice in 1910, his first clients being family friends. His practice was broken by the First World War during which he served with distinction in the London Scottish. He resumed practice at 23 Golden Square in 1919, his first major commission being Scottish, Cour in Argyll in an Arts and Crafts neo-Tudor style with Scottish nuances in the plan-form. In the late 1920s Hill moved office to 9 Hanover Street, London and from 1930 onwards he became a modernist under the influence of Raymond McGrath who had introduced him to Mansfield Forbes and the Twentieth Century Group, a circle of which Ian Lindsay, Robert Hurd and L A C Simpson were also members: and he became part of the 'Country Life' circle through sharing his weekend house, Valewood Farm, Haslemere with Christopher Hussey, then a enthusiast for continental modernism. He was not, however, wholly committed to the modern movement and continued to provide Arts and Crafts and accomplished neo-Georgian and Lutyensesque houses according to the desires of the client. Hill attempted to rejoin the London Scottish at the beginning of the Second World War but was not accepted because of his age. After the War when too many of his commissions did not go ahead, he turned his attention to the castles of his family's native Aberdeenshire, articles on which were published in 'Country Life' from 1945. This interest soon extended to the rest of Scotland and culminated in the publication of 'Scottish Castles of the 16th and 17th Centuries' published in 1953, the year in which he eventually married. By that date he had partly retired from practice and was living at his country house, Daneway, Gloucestershire, from which he continued his practice, mainly on a consultancy basis but including one substantial house, the Priory at Long Newton, Gloucestershire (1966) until his death at Daneway on 28 May 1968. His last book, 'English Country Houses: Caroline' - the writing of which was assisted by John Cornforth on Hussey's advice - was published in their joint names in 1966.
Andrew Graham (known as Graham) Henderson was born in 1882 in Auckland, New Zealand, the son of William Nisbet Henderson, draper and commission agent, and his wife Elizabeth Black Graham. He served his apprenticeship with Macwhannell & Rogerson from July 1898 to September 1903 , attending classes at Glasgow School of Art and the Glasgow and West of Scotland Technical College from 1899-1901. Thereafter he was an assistant to William Baillie of Glasgow for eight months, moving to the practice of Honeyman Keppie & Mackintosh in April 1904. Between 1906 and 1910 he was an assistant to Professor Eugène Bourdon at Glasgow School of Art and made he made three study tours to the Continent spending periods in Normandy, Italy and Belgium. In 1910 he moved to become Principal teacher of Architecture and Building Construction at Paisley College of Technology, a post which he held until 1921. In June and July 1909 he had spent an intensive period of study in London and had passed the qualifying exam and was elected ARIBA in 1910, winning the Arthur Cates Prize in the following year, his obituarist noting that for this he had submitted 'a superb set of drawings and throughout his long career he was admired for his skill as a designer, accomplished draughtsman and colourist'. In his early days as assistant to Honeyman, Keppie & Mackintosh he worked on the Oval Room in the Ingram Street tearooms, being responsible for the interior, including the designs for the carpets and furnishings. By 1914 he had achieved an important position within the practice, having secured the commission for the Demonstration School at Jordanhill in the 1913 competition and won the competition for the Glasgow Cross reconstruction outright. After Mackintosh failed to complete the firm's submission for Jordanhill adequately he is said to have told Keppie that he would not accept a partnership if Mackintosh remained with the firm, prompting a financial review of the practice which resulted in Keppie & Mackintosh's partnership being dissolved at Keppie's request. During the First World War Henderson served with the Glasgow Highlanders and was severely wounded. He was hospitalised at Rouen and at Bangour. He lost the use of his right arm and hand, but refused to accept this as a handicap and re-learnt to write and draw with his left hand. While on active service in 1914-15 Keppie paid him a retainer of £216 per annum. He was 'nominally' in partnership with Keppie (with whom he had become a close friend) from January 1916 but in practice he only joined the firm as partner after the end of hostilities. During the 1920s he edited the journal of the RIAS. Henderson was elected FRIBA in 1931, his proposers being Keppie, John Watson and George Arthur Boswell. During the 1930s his skill as a designer received wider recognition: in a review of bank buildings in Britain, Professor Reilly of Liverpool chose the Bank of Scotland in Sauchiehall Street as the best example of its kind in the country. In 1938 he was awarded the RIBA Gold Medal for the design of Cloberhill School in Glasgow. Keppie retired in 1937 or 1938 when his health began to fail. At the beginning of the Second World War Henderson organised the War Valuation Department in Glasgow Area. In 1941 he was appointed Quartering Commandant for West Scotland District with the rank of Lieutenant Colonel. In 1945-47 he was elected President of the RIAS and in 1950 he was elected President of the RIBA. He was the first Scot to be elected to this office whilst practising only in Scotland. This involved him in a great deal of travel within the UK but also abroad to Canada and the US towards the end of his second term of office, the highlight being a tour across Canada for the Annual Assembly of the Royal Architectural Institute of Canada at Vancouver, followed by a trip through the United States from San Francisco to Washington and New York. He did not, however, receive the knighthood usual at that time: the reasons are not known but may have related to differences with Oliver Hill who had tried to replace him as architect to the Queen Mother at Birkhall during his presidency. Despite losing the use of his right arm, Henderson still enjoyed golf in his spare time and for a number of years spent an Easter break in Tenby in Pembrokeshire on golfing holidays with his friends Percy Thomas, Thomas E Scott and C D Spragg. He died on 21 November 1963, survived by his wife, whom he married on 3 June 1919 at Pollokshields Parish Church, and his daughter.
Graham Law and James Dunbar-Nasmith set up the practice of Law and Dunbar-Nasmith in 1957, with an office at 54 Frederick Street, Edinburgh. Their first job was a pair of farm cottages at Cublington. About 1967 the office was moved to 16 Dublin Street. In 1975 the practice opened another branch in Forres at 130 High Street moving later to St Leonard's Road. Law and Dunbar-Nasmith were mentioned in the Sunday Times competition for the extension to the National Gallery.
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