Richard Reynolds Rowe (5 June 1824 – 21 December 1899) was an English architect and

civil engineer A civil engineer is a person who practices civil engineering – the application of planning, designing, constructing, maintaining, and operating infrastructure while protecting the public and environmental health, as well as improving existing i ...

, mainly active in

Cambridge Cambridge ( ) is a List of cities in the United Kingdom, city and non-metropolitan district in the county of Cambridgeshire, England. It is the county town of Cambridgeshire and is located on the River Cam, north of London. As of the 2021 Unit ...

and

Cambridgeshire Cambridgeshire (abbreviated Cambs.) is a Ceremonial counties of England, ceremonial county in the East of England and East Anglia. It is bordered by Lincolnshire to the north, Norfolk to the north-east, Suffolk to the east, Essex and Hertfor ...

. His best-known work is the

Cambridge Corn Exchange The Corn Exchange is an events and concert venue located on Wheeler Street, Cambridge, Wheeler Street in Cambridge, Cambridgeshire, England. The structure, which was commissioned as a corn exchange, is a Grade II listed building. History The ...

Biography

Richard Reynolds Rowe was born in 1824, the son of Richard Rowe, a Cambridge

alderman An alderman is a member of a Municipal government, municipal assembly or council in many jurisdictions founded upon English law with similar officials existing in the Netherlands (wethouder) and Belgium (schepen). The term may be titular, denotin ...

. He attended school at Eaton-Socon, and then either school or university in Cambridge. In his early career he worked mainly as a civil engineer. His first position was on the

Isle of Man The Isle of Man ( , also ), or Mann ( ), is a self-governing British Crown Dependency in the Irish Sea, between Great Britain and Ireland. As head of state, Charles III holds the title Lord of Mann and is represented by a Lieutenant Govern ...

, as clerk of works for St Thomas's Church,

Douglas Douglas may refer to: People * Douglas (given name) * Douglas (surname) Animals * Douglas (parrot), macaw that starred as the parrot ''Rosalinda'' in Pippi Longstocking * Douglas the camel, a camel in the Confederate Army in the American Civil ...

(1847). He next worked on water supply and drainage projects in Essex.Obituary: Richard Reynolds Rowe 1824–1899. ''Minutes of the Proceedings of the Institution of Civil Engineers'' 141 (3): 349–50 (1900) In 1850 he set up practice in Cambridge as an architect, from 1893 in partnership with C. R. Scott,Death of Mr. R. Reynolds Rowe. ''Cambridge Chronicle'' (22 December 1899)
courtesy link
and designed and built several buildings around Cambridge and elsewhere in Cambridgeshire. He was the borough surveyor in 1850–69, and also served as the architect attached to the Cambridgeshire and Isle of Ely Asylum at

Fulbourn Fulbourn is a village in Cambridgeshire, England, with evidence of settlement dating back to Neolithic times. The village was probably established under its current name by 1200. The waterfowl-frequented stream after which it was named lies i ...

and the clerk of works for

Ely Cathedral Ely Cathedral, formally the Cathedral Church of the Holy and Undivided Trinity of Ely, is an Church of England, Anglican cathedral in the city of Ely, Cambridgeshire, England. The cathedral can trace its origin to the abbey founded in Ely in 67 ...

. He was an elected fellow of the

Royal Institute of British Architects The Royal Institute of British Architects (RIBA) is a professional body for architects primarily in the United Kingdom, but also internationally, founded for the advancement of architecture under its royal charter granted in 1837, three suppl ...

, the Society of Antiquaries and the Surveyors' Institution, a member of the Institute of Civil Engineers (1859), and served as president of the Institute of Sanitary Engineers. His other honours include being a Knight of Justice of the

Order of St John of Jerusalem The Order of Knights of the Hospital of Saint John of Jerusalem, commonly known as the Knights Hospitaller (), is a Catholic military order. It was founded in the crusader Kingdom of Jerusalem in the 12th century and had headquarters there u ...

. Rowe was married. With

William John Beamont William John Beamont (1828–1868) was an England, English clergyman, founder of Anglia Ruskin University, the Cambridge School of Art, current Anglia Ruskin University, and author. Early life and education Beamont was born at Warrington, Lancas ...

, he was associated with the foundation of the

Church Congress Church Congress is an annual meeting of members of the Church of England, lay and clerical, to discuss matters religious, moral or social, in which the church is interested. It has no legislative authority, and there is no voting on the questions d ...

in 1861. In later life, he lived at Parkside in Cambridge. He died on 21 December 1899. His funeral was held at

St Andrew the Great St Andrew the Great is a Church of England parish church in central Cambridge. Rebuilt in late Gothic style in 1843, it is a Grade II listed building. The church has a Conservative Evangelicalism in Britain, conservative evangelical tradition an ...

and he was buried at Mill Road Cemetery.Funeral of Mr. R. R. Rowe at Cambridge. ''Cambridge Weekly News'', p. 8 (29 December 1899)

Works

His most-notable work in Cambridge is the

(1873–75).Richard Reynolds Rowe, F.S.A., R.I.B.A. (1824-99)
''The Victorian Web'', 25 July 2011. Accessed 29 April 2013. His other buildings in the town include St Matthew's Church (1864–66), number 6, Trumpington Road (1866), Wilton Terrace, Station Road, almshouses on King Street (1880), and (with C. R. Scott) the Red Cow pub on Corn Exchange Street (1898). Outside Cambridge, he built Anglican churches at Burwell (1863),

Prickwillow Prickwillow is a village in Cambridgeshire, England, with an estimated population of 440. Originally a small Hamlet (place), hamlet on the banks of the River Great Ouse, it is now on the banks of the River Lark since re-organisation of the river ...

(1865–66) and

Wendy Wendy is a given name generally given to girls in English-speaking countries. In Britain during the English Civil War in the mid-1600s, a male Captain Wendy Oxford was identified by the Leveller John Lilburne as a spy reporting on his activit ...

(1866; demolished in around 1950), and was involved in restoring many Anglican churches in Cambridgeshire, including those at Stuntney (1875–76) and Haddenham (1871–77). He also built vicarages or rectories at Graveley (1853–54),

(1859) and

Chatteris Chatteris () is a market town and civil parish in the Fenland district of Cambridgeshire, England, situated in the Fens between Huntingdon, March and Ely. The town is in the North East Cambridgeshire parliamentary constituency. The parish o ...

(1878–80). His non-ecclesiastical work in Cambridgeshire includes the police station (1855) at Linton and Arkenstall's Endowed School at Haddenham (1863).Bradley & Pevsner, pp. 409, 560

References

Source *Simon Bradley,

Nikolaus Pevsner Sir Nikolaus Bernhard Leon Pevsner (30 January 1902 – 18 August 1983) was a German-British art historian and architectural historian best known for his monumental 46-volume series of county-by-county guides, ''The Buildings of England'' (195 ...

. ''Cambridgeshire'' (''

The Buildings of England ''The'' is a grammatical article in English, denoting nouns that are already or about to be mentioned, under discussion, implied or otherwise presumed familiar to listeners, readers, or speakers. It is the definite article in English. ''The ...

'' series) (Yale University Press; 2014)

External links

*
Richard Reynolds Rowe
– biography at Mill Road Cemetery website {{DEFAULTSORT:Rowe, Richard Reynolds 1824 births 1899 deaths People from Cambridge 19th-century English architects Architects from Cambridgeshire Fellows of the Society of Antiquaries of London Fellows of the Royal Institute of British Architects Knights of Justice of the Order of St John