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'''Roderick Gradidge''' [[AAdipl]] [[ARIBA]] (1929 – 2000) was a prominent [[United Kingdom|British]] [[architect]] and [[writer]] on architecture, former Master of the [[Arts Workers Guild]] and campaigner for a traditional architecture.
== Biography ==
=== Career ===
Roderick was an evangelist for the [[Arts & Crafts]], the [[Victorian]] and a [[vernacularVernacular]] architecture which had become so unfashionable by the beginning of his career. It is this passion that drove him to his writing career and to become a repository of the knowledge of the architecture of this period and in particular in the County of [[Surrey]], (near his home at [[Chiswick]],) where so much interesting architecture was produced in this period. Roderick had the opportunity to work on a number of buildings in the Countycounty by prominent architects, such as [[Sir Edwin Lutyens]], [[Harold Falkner]], [[Hugh Thackeray Turner]], [[Detmar Blow]] and [[Charles Voysey]]. He completed a number of interesting projects elsewhere, particularly with fine interiors and country houses. One of his finest country house commissions was for a large extension at ''Fulbrook House'',one of [[Lutyens]]’s finest and earliest country house commissions outside [[Farnham]], [[Surrey]] and which he published in his book, the Surrey Style<ref>The Surrey Style: see bibilography</ref>. He designed a library with [[David Hicks]] at [[Nicholas Hawksmoor]]’s [[Easton Neston]] in the style of the [[English Baroque]] for [[Lord Hesketh]], a [[Gothick]] conservatory at [[Cholmondeley Castle]] and altered [[Mount Stuart]] for [[Lord Bute]]. He worked on a number of pub interiors for [[Ind Coope]], such as the ''Markham Arms'' (now altered) on the [[Kings Road]], [[Chelsea]] and the ''Three Greyhounds'' in [[Soho]], [[London]]. He restored the [[Gothic]] interior of [[E W Godwin]]’s [[Northampton Guildhall]], and the interior of [[Bodelwyddan Castle]] for the [[National Portrait Gallery]], which won the Museum of the Year Award in 1989. At ''St Marys, Bourne Street'', [[South Kensington]] and the [[National Portrait Gallery]] in [[London]], he also did some interior modifications, although the latter has since been altered.
He was active in the [[Art Workers Guild]], acted as its Secretary from 1977-84 and Master in 1987. He was a founding member of the [[Georgian Society]] (later to become the [[20th Century Society]]) and was prominent in the [[Victorian Society]], at a time when these were marginal interests within the architectural profession.
===Partnership with Michael Blower===
Roderick completed a number of fine restorations and extensions to country houses in Surrey in the 1980’s and 1990’s. He did these in a loose partnership with the prominent Surrey-based architect, [[Michael Blower]]. Their first projectprojects waswere on [[Voysey]]'s ''New House'' in [[Haslemere]] and on [[Detmar Blow]]’s ''Charles Hill Court'' for an Austrian industrialist. From there, they went onto [[Harold Falkner]]’s ''Tancreds Ford'', which they designed and built for the writer [[Ken Follett]] and his first wife, and which was published in two articles in [[Country Life]]<ref>Country Life November 17th & 24th 1983</ref>. Next came ''The New House'', reputedly designed by [[Hugh Thackeray Turner]] and for which they jointly one a [[RIBA]] Award, which was also published in [[Country Life]]<ref>Country Life September 3rd 1998</ref>. Just prior to his death, they were working on a project at ''Combe Court'', which was completed by [[Michael Blower’sBlower]] and his sons through their architectural practice, [[Stedman Blower]].
=== Personal life ===
Roddy was born [[3 January]] [[1929]] in [[Old Hunstanton]], [[Norfolk]], and died [[20 December]] [[2000]] in [[London]], aged 71. H. His father [[Brigadier]] John Gradidge, was posted in [[India]] at the time of his son's birth, who was then brought up amidst the splendours of the [[British Raj]]. He was sent off to schoolPublic School at [[Stowe]] and from there and after 2 years [[National Service]] in the [[Palestine]], he moved to [[London]] and the [[Architectural Association]], where he completed his training as an architect and was elected an Associate of the [[Royal Institute of British Architects]] ([[ARIBA]]). He remained in [[London]] parctisingpractising as an architect and writer for most of his life, where he was a prominent figure in social and architectural circles in the last half of the [[20th Century]]. He was long-time member of the congregation of the Anglo-Catholic St Mary’s, Bourne Street, South Kensington. He had no children and was never married.
== Legacy ==
[[The Telegraph]] obituary<ref>The fromTelegraph theNewspaper 22nd December 2000</ref> described him as ''one of the most colourful and underrated [[English people|English]] architects of recent years''. Obituaries also appeared in [[The Times]]<ref>The onTimes theNewspaper 1st January 2001</ref> and in [[The Independent]]<ref>The onIndependent theNewspaper 2nd January 2001</ref>, the latter one penned by the prominent architectural historian and critic [[Gavin Stamp]]. Another heavyweight writer and architectural critic, [[Kenneth Powell]] wrote in the late 1980’s that Roderick ''would merit rather more than a footnote when the history of late 20th Century British architecture comes to be written''<ref>See Obituary in The Independent Newspaper 2nd January 2001</ref>. At the twightlighttwilight of his career, he was awarded a [[RIBA]] Award, (the gold-standard of archiecturalarchitectural awards in the UK) for the design of a house in the [[Surrey Hills]], completed with his sometime architectural partner [[Michael Blower]]. Perhaps though, his legacy is limited in that he never completed a whole building from scratch and in so far as what remains of his work as an [[architect]] are wholly interiors, extensions, alterations and extensions to pre-existing buildings. Fortunately, many of these are [[Listed Buildings]] and they will survive as a testament to his career.
==Notes==
{{reflist|2}}
==Bibliography==
* ''Dream Houses: The Edwardian Ideal'' , by Roderick Gradidge. Constable, 1980 (hardback, ISBN 0-009-0461930-1).
* ''Edwin Lutyens: Architect Laureate'', by Roderick Gradidge. London: George Allen & Unwin Ltd, 1981 (hardback, ISBN 0-720023-5).
* ''The Surrey Style'', by Roderick Gradidge. Kingston: Surrey Historic Buildings Trust, 1991 (paperback, ISBN 0-9517022-0-3).
==References==
{{Reflist}}
==External links==
*[http://www.findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_qn4158/is_20010102/ai_n9663039 Obituary] in The Independent by [[Gavin Stamp]]
*The Blower Foundation (for cultural connection) are a registered UK Charity devoted to cultural heritage and expression and [http://www.cultural-connection.org] hold an archive of drawings by [[Michael Blower]] and Roderick Gradidge and have an online gallery of buildings by both architects.
*Stedman Blower Architects[http://www.stedmanblower.co.uk] hold additional correspondence and detailed information on the projects by [[Michael Blower]] and Roderick Gradidge.
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[[Category:2000 deaths]]
[[Category:Architects]]
[[Category:Arts & Crafts Architects]]
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