Francis Reginald Stevens Yorke (3 December 1906 – 10 June 1962), known professionally as F. R. S. Yorke
and informally as "Kay" or "K," was an
English architect
An architect is a person who plans, designs, and oversees the construction of buildings. To practice architecture means to provide services in connection with the design of buildings and the space within the site surrounding the buildings that h ...
and
author
In legal discourse, an author is the creator of an original work that has been published, whether that work exists in written, graphic, visual, or recorded form. The act of creating such a work is referred to as authorship. Therefore, a sculpt ...
.
One of the first native British architects to design in a
modernist
Modernism was an early 20th-century movement in literature, visual arts, and music that emphasized experimentation, abstraction, and Subjectivity and objectivity (philosophy), subjective experience. Philosophy, politics, architecture, and soc ...
style, he made numerous contacts with leading European architects while contributing to ''
Architects' Journal
''Architects' Journal'' is a professional architecture magazine, published monthly in London by Metropolis International. Each issue includes in-depth features on relevant current affairs, alongside profiles of recently completed buildings. Ten t ...
'' in the 1930s, and in 1933 was secretary and founder member of the
MARS Group. From 1935 until 1962 he was the editor of an annual publication ''Specification''. Between 1935 and 1937 he worked in partnership with the
Hungarian architect and former
Bauhaus
The Staatliches Bauhaus (), commonly known as the , was a German art school operational from 1919 to 1933 that combined Decorative arts, crafts and the fine arts.Oxford Dictionary of Art and Artists (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 4th edn., ...
teacher
Marcel Breuer
Marcel Lajos Breuer ( ; 21 May 1902 – 1 July 1981) was a Hungarian-American modernist architect and furniture designer. He moved to the United States in 1937 and became a naturalized American citizen in 1944.
At the Bauhaus he designed the Was ...
, before forming the
Yorke Rosenberg Mardall
Yorke Rosenberg Mardall (Yorke, Rosenberg and Mardall, YRM) was a British architectural firm established by F. R. S. Yorke (1906-1962), Eugene Rosenberg (1907-1990) and Cyril Mardall (Sjöström) (1909-1994) in 1944.Melvin, Jeremy (1997). Obit ...
partnership in 1944 together with
Eugene Rosenberg (1907-1990) and
Cyril Mardall (Sjöström) (1909-1994), with whom he designed many post-war buildings including
Gatwick Airport
Gatwick Airport , also known as London Gatwick Airport (), is the Airports of London, secondary international airport serving London, West Sussex and Surrey. It is located near Crawley in West Sussex, south of Central London. In 2024, Gatwic ...
.
Yorke was born in
Stratford-upon-Avon
Stratford-upon-Avon ( ), commonly known as Stratford, is a market town and civil parish in the Stratford-on-Avon (district), Stratford-on-Avon district, in the county of Warwickshire, in the West Midlands (region), West Midlands region of Engl ...
, where his father was also an architect, and studied architecture and planning at the
Birmingham School of Architecture, where his fellow students included other notable early modernist figures including
Richard Sheppard,
Frederick Gibberd
Sir Frederick Ernest Gibberd CBE (7 January 1908 – 9 January 1984) was an English architect, town planner and landscape designer. He is particularly known for his work in Harlow, Essex, and for the BISF house, a design for a prefabricated ...
,
Colin Penn and
Robert Furneaux Jordan.
The Modern House
In 1934, Yorke wrote ''The Modern House'', a book that introduced modernist houses, fourteen pages of which were dedicated to English examples. Yorke was inspired by seeing modern architecture on his
Prague
Prague ( ; ) is the capital and List of cities and towns in the Czech Republic, largest city of the Czech Republic and the historical capital of Bohemia. Prague, located on the Vltava River, has a population of about 1.4 million, while its P ...
visit in 1931 and initially collaborated on the book with the Czech architect Karel Honzík. He wrote a follow-up article in the ''Architectural Review'' in 1936 focusing on the use of concrete and this included a further eleven English houses. These contributions helped lay the basis for the postwar English fascination with concrete. In 1937 he published ''The Modern House in England'' which illustrated houses from a number of his fellows from the MARS group. The book was split into chapters on brick and stone, timber frame and concrete. It included a foreword by
William Lethaby. Also in 1937 Yorke together with
Frederick Gibberd
Sir Frederick Ernest Gibberd CBE (7 January 1908 – 9 January 1984) was an English architect, town planner and landscape designer. He is particularly known for his work in Harlow, Essex, and for the BISF house, a design for a prefabricated ...
published ''The Modern Flat'' and in 1939 with Colin Penn ''A Key to Modern Architecture''.
Notable buildings
*
Torilla, a house at Nast Hyde, Hatfield (1935)
*
Gane Pavilion, Bristol (1936), with
Marcel Breuer
Marcel Lajos Breuer ( ; 21 May 1902 – 1 July 1981) was a Hungarian-American modernist architect and furniture designer. He moved to the United States in 1937 and became a naturalized American citizen in 1944.
At the Bauhaus he designed the Was ...
* House in High Street, Iver (1936)
* Sea Lane House, Angmering-on-Sea (1937) with
Marcel Breuer
Marcel Lajos Breuer ( ; 21 May 1902 – 1 July 1981) was a Hungarian-American modernist architect and furniture designer. He moved to the United States in 1937 and became a naturalized American citizen in 1944.
At the Bauhaus he designed the Was ...
- now a Grade II
Listed Building
In the United Kingdom, a listed building is a structure of particular architectural or historic interest deserving of special protection. Such buildings are placed on one of the four statutory lists maintained by Historic England in England, Hi ...
.
* Shangri-la, Lee-on-the-Solent (1937), with
Marcel Breuer
Marcel Lajos Breuer ( ; 21 May 1902 – 1 July 1981) was a Hungarian-American modernist architect and furniture designer. He moved to the United States in 1937 and became a naturalized American citizen in 1944.
At the Bauhaus he designed the Was ...
* Forge House,
Sutton
Sutton (''south settlement'' or ''south town'' in Old English) may refer to:
Places
United Kingdom
England
In alphabetical order by county:
* Sutton, Bedfordshire
* Sutton, Berkshire, a List of United Kingdom locations: Stu-Sz#Su, location
* S ...
(1937)
* Houses at Eton (1938), with
Marcel Breuer
Marcel Lajos Breuer ( ; 21 May 1902 – 1 July 1981) was a Hungarian-American modernist architect and furniture designer. He moved to the United States in 1937 and became a naturalized American citizen in 1944.
At the Bauhaus he designed the Was ...
* Seven cottages, Stratford-on-Avon (1939) with F.W.B. Yorke
* New House,
Luccombe, Isle of Wight (1946)
[
* Rectory at Wootton by Woodstock, Oxfordshire (1954)
* Crawley Hospital (1959–61), with ]Yorke Rosenberg Mardall
Yorke Rosenberg Mardall (Yorke, Rosenberg and Mardall, YRM) was a British architectural firm established by F. R. S. Yorke (1906-1962), Eugene Rosenberg (1907-1990) and Cyril Mardall (Sjöström) (1909-1994) in 1944.Melvin, Jeremy (1997). Obit ...
References
Literature
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{{DEFAULTSORT:Yorke, F. R. S.
People from Stratford-upon-Avon
1906 births
1962 deaths
20th-century English architects
Alumni of the Birmingham School of Art
Architects from Warwickshire