The Liverpool School of Architecture was established in 1894 and became the first University in the UK to award a RIBA accredited degree in Architecture. The school has a long history of honors and awards, including six RIBA Gold Medallists that have been staff or graduates. The influence of the Liverpool School can be found in the architecture of the city and of the world. This exhibition looks at the student work of just a few of the individuals who have passed through its doors.
Jack Dunne & Peter Richmond, The World in One School, The History and Influence of the Liverpool School of Architecture (Liverpool University Press, 2008).
Eric Michael Bottomley
Michael Bottomley (1927-2015) was a student of the Liverpool School of Architecture between 1945 and 1949. He was elected an associate member of The Royal Institute of British Architects in 1949.
D1132/60 - Student architectural drawing: An Electrical Exhibition - Aerial View
He later became a partner in Haigh Architects of Kendal, with whom he had worked as a student placement during 1947.
D1132/66 - Student architectural drawing: An Administrative Centre for the Lake District National Park- Plan
In addition to his work as an architect he was also an accomplished artist, working in watercolour and pastel and capturing the changing character of the historic town of Kendal during his lifetime.
D1132/57 - Student architectural drawing: Officer's Mess III, Perspective
Wesley Dougill
Wesley Dougill (1893-1943) graduated from the Liverpool School of Architecture in 1922 with a first class honours degree, went on to study for an MA, came second in the Prix de Rome of 1921, and was awarded a silver medal by the Royal Institute of British Architects.
He later went back to the University of Liverpool, taking the dual post of senior lecturer and research fellow. He was a member of the Town Planning Institute for many years, studied and wrote about the English village, became the recognised authority on English coastal preservation and development, and played a major role in the development of the London Plan.
Left: DGL/1/3/1/4 - Student architectural drawing: Bramante's Tempietto, Rome - Perspective Cutaway
Right: DGL/1/3/1/5 - Student architectural drawing: Bramante's Tempietto, Rome - Plan of Lower Chamber
This image shows one of Dougill’s student drawings for which he was awarded the silver medal in the 1923 RIBA Measured Drawings Prize.
In a review of work submitted for the Prizes Henry Ashley expressed his great admiration for Dougill's work:
...perhaps as fine a set of drawings as has ever been sent in, comprising a complete survey of a group of classic buildings, the Campidoglio at Rome. There is little but praise due for the work exhibited; it is a most careful study in plan, elevation and section, and the drawings, eight strainers in all, are most beautifully rendered in a very intelligible manner, and the sketches and measurements taken on the spot are all just what they should be. I particularly appreciate the half-inch scale and full-size details of the museum section, these are line drawings, with no colour, and full of dimensions — they strike you at once as measured drawings, while the others, at first sight, might be designs for the Tite or Soane.
[...]
I commend these drawings to the students as examples of what architectural drawings should be, and I congratulate the author, Mr. Dougill, whose work so entirely merits the medal.
Journal of the Royal Institute of British Architects, Vol. 30, No. 7, 10 Feb 1923
DGL/1/3/2/6 - Student architectural drawing: Campidoglio, Rome - Half-inch Details of Museum
Norah Dunphy
Norah Dunphy graduated from the Liverpool School of Architecture in 1926. She was the first woman to obtain the degree of Bachelor of Architecture in the country.
Left: DUN/14 - Student architectural drawing: A Catafalque
Right: DUN/15 - Student architectural drawing: An Opera Scene
She studied Architecture under Professor Charles Reilly and obtained a first-class certificate in Civic Design studying in the Department of Civic Design under Professor Abercrombie.
DUN/11 - Student architectural drawing: Llandudno - Civic Survey
Norah Dunphy went on to become the first woman in the country to be employed as a town planner, appointed as Town Planning Assistant to the Tynemouth and North Shields Corporation in 1931.
In later life she took an academic role and taught planning. The Norah Dunphy Gold Award for Architecture is made by the National Eisteddfod of Wales.
Robert Maxwell
Robert Maxwell (1922-2020) received a degree of B. Arch (Hons) and a Diploma of Civic Design at Liverpool University, graduating in 1949.
At Liverpool he met lifelong friends Colin Rowe, Douglas Stephen and James Stirling, who enlisted Maxwell to draw his thesis designs.
Robert Maxwell joined the faculty at the Architectural Association (1958 to 1962) while working as an architect in London, in 1962 completing the Kirke house in Kennington Park Road. He then joined the LCC where he worked on the Royal Festival Hall extensions. Later, as a partner at Douglas Stephen & Partners, he participated in the design of the Brunel Centre, Swindon, and Southwood Park Apartments in Highgate.
In 1962 he joined the Faculty of the Bartlett School, University College London, where he taught for twenty years. Maxwell was appointed there as Dean of Architecture, (from 1982) and remained there for eleven years.
Returning to the U.K. in 1993, he was invited to teach the history of Modern architecture at the Architectural Association (1994 to 2006).
RMM/1/2/1/1 - Student architectural drawing: A University Institute of Art History
Development of 74 apartments at Southwood Park, Highgate, constructed 1968. Designed by Robert Maxwell for Douglas Stephen & Partners.
The two brutalist apartment blocks in red brick and white concrete floorbands are considered a fine example of modernist design. Nikolaus Pevsner, the German-British art historian, commented that the apartments were a “forceful example” of their type, built at “the height of fashion for expressive concrete construction”.
RMM/2/15/5 - Architectural drawing: Southwood Park Apartments
Redesign proposition of modernist 'High and Over', Amersham, Bucks, England 'in memoriam' to architect Amyas Connel in the year of his death. Shinkenchiku Residential Design competition for 'A House at the Juncture of History and Now'. Celia Scott and Robert Maxwell.
Entrants to the competition were required to select a house which 'expressed the culture of their nation' and to make 'renovations and improvements' appropriate for their use. Robert Maxwell and Celia Scott chose Amyas Connell's 'High and Over' in Amersham. Their proposal was to contain the house in a circle, with new uses for the newly enclosed spaces.
RMM/2/25/1 - Architectural drawing: High and Over
Maxwell Fry
Maxwell Fry (1899-1987) was born in Wallasey and entered Liverpool University School of Architecture in 1920. After studying under Professor Charles Reilly, Maxwell graduated with distinction in 1923.
The drawing displayed here was selected for the Rome Scholarship final during his time at university.
Some of Maxwell Fry’s early works include the neo-classical railway stations at Margate, Ramsgate and Dumpton Park that he designed whilst working as an assistant in the architect's department of the Southern Railway
S3204/3/9 - Student architectural drawing: Rome Scholarship final
With time Maxwell Fry's approach to architecture gradually changed and his interest in modern German housing caused a shift towards modernism. As a result, he became one of a few British modernist architects working in Britain. Fry practised alongside well-known European modernists Walter Gropius and Le Corbusier and is regarded as the father of the Modern movement in architecture in Britain.
Brodie Tower on Brownlow Street, shown here, is an example of Fry's modernist design that can be found on campus. On the impactful eastern façade the names of famous engineers are displayed in pre-cast concrete on a curved wall.
Image from the University of Liverpool. Masterplan Estate Strategy 2026+. Campus Built Heritage
Student works: Magazine on Liverpool redevelopment
This magazine, produced by students from the School of Architecture in the 1960s, was written in reaction to the redevelopment plans being produced by the Liverpool City Planning Office. The illustrated booklet offers ‘alternative approaches to modernising a very special city’. The authors discus the importance of small businesses, encourage family-friendly city centre development, question the role of the new motorway, call for public transport expansion and criticise the slum removal strategy, while offering human-centred approaches that would benefit the residents of Liverpool.
Follow the link below to read the full version.
D832/1/1 - illustrated booklet: Hey Yes, You La! What is going on in our Liverpool?
Student works: H. N. Mason (1947)
D508/A/2/1 - Student architectural drawing: Merseyside Industrial Exhibition
D508/A/2/1- Student architectural drawing: Merseyside Industrial Exhibition
Student works: H. N. Mason (1947)
D508/A/2/1 - Student architectural drawing: A Pleasure Island off the Coast of S. W. Wales
Student works: Dewi-Prys Thomas
Dewi-Prys Thomas (1916-1985) was born in Liverpool into a Welsh family. He graduated from the University of Liverpool in 1939 with a First Class BArch degree and multiple prizes. After working with Cardiff architects for seven years, he was invited back to Liverpool to teach.
In 1960 he was appointed head of the Welsh School of Architecture and four years later became the first Professor of Architecture at the University of Wales. There he established a separate Department of Town Planning and contributed to the growth of the school.
Thomas was received as a member of the Gorsedd (a society of those who have contributed to Wales) at the National Eisteddfod held in Swansea in 1982 for training hundreds of architects in Wales and beyond.
S3204/3/11 (1) - Student architectural drawing: A Concert Enclosure at Otterspool in Liverpool
S3204/3/11 (2) - Student architectural drawing: A Concert Enclosure at Otterspool in Liverpool - Plan
Dewi-Prys Thomas was a commissioner on the Royal Commission on the Ancient and Historical Monuments of Wales and a founder member of the civic society, Cardiff 2000, which he chaired for three years. He was also an environmental campaigner and represented various bodies, such as Civic Trust Wales and the Council for the Protection of Rural Wales.
In 1990 a trust in his name was established to promote excellence in architecture, town planning, civic design, landscape design and other creative disciplines that contribute to the quality of life, identity and regeneration of Wales. Since 2023 The Dewi-Prys Thomas Prize has been awarded annually by RIBA.
His papers are held by the National Library of Wales.
A254/1/3 - Student architectural drawing: Chapel (Nineteenth-century Welsh Calvinistic Methodist Chapel converted by the University of Liverpool and now known as the Chatham Building.)
Student works: Philip Hugh Lawson
Philip Hugh Lawson (1887-1966) was a Chester architect. He acted as a Vice-President of the Flintshire Historical Society and from 1930 as Editor of the 'Journal of the Chester Archaeological Society'.
D622 - Student architectural drawing: Design for a City Concert Hall
Student works: T.C.Yuen
Thesis design for a House for a Chinese Scholar in Hong Kong by a fifth year student.
S3204/7B/28 -Student architectural drawing: A Residence for a Chinese scholar
Student works: Ernest Harold Corner
D622 - Student architectural drawing: Sketch Design for a Pendentive
Student works: Ernest Harold Corner
D622 - Student architectural drawing: Sketch design for a ceiling
Browse the rest of the exhibition: University Places and Spaces