Drapers’ Almshouses, Margate

H. W. Brewer

c. 1880

Signed with initials lower left

Source: Stevenson’s House Architecture, I, 330

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Commentary by J. J. Stevenson

Drapers' Hospital, near Margate, belonging to the Quakers, is a characteristic specimen of a type of English architecture which has lately acquired notoriety under the name of "Queen Anne." Whatever may be thought of its merits, it has claim, I think, to be called a true and national style. It is a builder's, not an architect's, style, the product of traditions naturally developing themselves. At the end of the seventeenth century brick had become the common building material of the country, and Classic forms and mouldings the vernacular of the workmen, who, following apparently their own instincts, formed the style out of these elements, without drawings from architects, who were too learned to tolerate its barbarism. In this instance, though the walls are of the usual flint building of the district, all the architectural parts are in brick, the grey and red making a beautiful contrast of colour. The style is common in the villages and cottages of the neighbourhood.

The shaping of the gables into various curves, which is one of the characteristics of the style, is a simple and natural and consequently cheap mode of producing an effect in brick. It is one of the many ways in which the builders in every country, still inspired by the old Gothic freedom, got rid of the trammels of Classic rule.

Bibliography

Stevenson, J. J. House Architecture. 2 vols. London: Macmillan, 1880.

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Last modified 17 July 2017