For our final Tea Time Talk, Nicholas Merchant will take us through a master in Victorian Gothic Revival, William Burges. Born in London in 1827, Burges’ career spanned the late Georgian into High Victorian period with his death in 1881 capping a prolific number of buildings.

A critic and arbiter of Victorian taste, Burges was a student of French medieval architecture similarly promoted by Viollet le Duc. He visited the Continent during his apprenticeship to gain first hand knowledge going on to design cathedrals in France, Ireland, and Australia. But in 1864, the passionate medievalist John Patrick Crichton Stuart, 3rd Marquess of Bute, would become Burges’ most important patron commissioning him for an extensive restoration of Cardiff Castle. There Burges worked until his own death on a series of residential apartments developing an elaborate scheme of interior decoration that would set the standard for Victorian Gothic taste. Burges simultaneously adopted the style for his own home, Tower House in London, so passionate was he with the Victorian vocabulary.

Please join us to learn about this Fellow of the Royal Institute of British Architects and an Associate of the Royal Academy whose portfolio, treatises and drawings were trend setting.