Charles Winmill


Charles Canning Winmill FRIBA was an English architect working in the Arts and Crafts style during the late 19th and early 20th centuries. He spent much of his career in the London County Council's architects' department, before retiring early to focus on private work. He was a long-term active member of the Society for the Protection of Ancient Buildings, from 1898 onwards. He joined the Art Workers' Guild in 1917, served on the committee from 1927 to 1929, and helped to organise meetings and trips. He became a Fellow of the Royal Institute of British Architects in the late 1920s.

Early life and education

Charles Winmill was born at his parents' home in Balaam Street, Plaistow, East London, on 14 January 1865. His father was William Hill Winmill of West Ham, and his mother was Fanny Sarah of Henham, Essex. A second son, Hallett, was born in 1867, and the family moved to Forest Gate. They moved again in the autumn of 1868, to The Elms, Gorleston, Norfolk, from where they had a view of the sea. William was injured in an accident in early 1869 and died in Yarmouth Hospital on 15 April. His widow gave birth to a third son, William, on 28 July 1869, and soon after this she took her three sons with her to live with an elderly aunt in the village of Newport, in her home county of Essex.
In about 1870 the family moved to Augusta Villa, Ramsgate, Kent, where Fanny ran a girls' boarding and day school: she was a good artist and taught drawing. Around this time Charles enjoyed going on country walks, looking at old buildings and ruins, which led to an early interest in architecture. In 1875 he attended Christ's Hospital School in the City of London, which he found a rather tough environment: he was good at drawing, but disliked exams. In 1880 he went for a year to Wenbigh Grammar School in Thornton Heath, where the headmaster, a Reverend T. H. Roberts, described the young Charles as 'perverse to the last'.
In early 1881, Winmill's mother arranged his first employment, in the manifest department at Millwall Docks, where he earned 10 shillings per week. From 17 January 1881, in order to be near to his work, he lodged with an elderly Frenchman at 81 Blackheath Hill, in south-east London, a tall red-brick house. The following year, Fanny gave up her school in Ramsgate and moved to Greenwich, so that all three of her sons could live with her. On dark winter mornings Charles taught his younger brother Hallett to cycle on a 52" Excelsior bicycle on Blackheath. In the mid-1880s, Charles joined the Artists' Rifles as a volunteer, and served for five years as a private; during manoeuvres on Wimbledon Common he once took a 'prisoner' who turned out to be the young Winston Churchill, about twelve years old at the time.

Professional work

Early training

In about 1884 Winmill was articled to John T. Newman of 2 Fenchurch Court, an architect and surveyor to the West Ham Board. Winmill learned a great deal from Newman, at the same time attending evening classes in design at the Architectural Association, at 9 Conduit Street. The Architectural Association's motto was 'Design with Beauty, Build in Truth', a concept which Winmill took to heart and followed throughout his career. In 1888 he left Newman's practice to become assistant to Leonard Stokes, a leading Roman Catholic architect with premises at 7 Storeys Gate, Westminster. During these early years, Winmill became strongly influenced by the Arts and Crafts Movement, led by the writer and designer William Morris and the architect Philip Webb, other architectural and design influences including William Richard Lethaby and Charles Voysey. Winmill remained with Stokes for four years, until moving on to the London County Council, where he was to spend the larger part of his career.

London County Council (LCC)

Winmill worked for the London County Council for 31 years, from 1892 to 1923. He worked in the architects' department, where he was responsible mainly for social housing and fire stations. In the early days he was based at the old LCC offices in Spring Gardens, London SW1. The first building he designed for the LCC was a row of cottages in Goldsmith's Row, Hackney, East London. Other schemes he was involved in included slum clearance and replanning of part of Shoreditch, as well as work in Bethnal Green and the Tabard Street area of Southwark.
A large part of Winmill's work was for the LCC's fire brigade section, under the leadership of Robert Pearsall. On 19 November 1897 there was a serious fire in Cripplegate, during which warehouses were destroyed, and it was decided that a new fire station was needed for the area. Winmill was put in charge, and the Red Cross Street fire station was completed in 1900, with its formal opening taking place on 23 February 1901. In December 1899 Winmill had become second in command of the LCC fire brigade section, helping to implement a five-year plan to double the number of fire stations in London, with a target of six per year. Another responsibility was the annual inspection of all London fire stations, during which he would note any requirements for alterations and additions.
His LCC work was very demanding during the First World War, as the fire brigade section was very short-staffed. Around this time an innovation from America was the installation of sliding poles in fire stations, replacing staircases. Another was the gradual replacement of horses by motorised engines. All of these changes required design changes to the fire station buildings. To coordinate this, Winmill worked well with the London Fire Brigade's Chief Officer, Sir Sampson Sladen. He also got on well with the politicians John Burns, a leading LCC council member and MP, and George Lansbury, a Poplar council member and MP.
In 1913 work on the new LCC County Hall building began; progress was slow because of the First World War, but Winmill moved into his new office there in around 1919, and the building was formally opened in 1922. In April 1919 Winmill had been promoted to 'principal assistant' and became head of his section, but he was less happy because of the shift of focus to administrative work. Then, in January 1923, an early retirement opportunity arose, and he was pleased to retire from the LCC at the end of September in order to concentrate on private commissions and his ongoing SPAB activities.

Society for the Protection of Ancient Buildings (SPAB)

The SPAB was formed to counteract what was regarded as destructive 19th century practices in the restoration of heritage buildings, including the scraping of ancient plaster off walls, and the romantic trend of allowing ivy to grow on buildings. Winmill joined the Society in 1898 and later served on the committee. He was on friendly terms with Philip Webb and Richard Lethaby, and did valuable work for the organisation throughout his career, contributing to the inspection, maintenance and repair of many medieval buildings, especially churches, including:
Other buildings he visited were in Chard, the Isle of Caldey, and Lundy Island. His main criteria in this valuable work were craftsmanship and simplicity.
His work on St Mary Stratford atte Bowe was especially significant: he co-wrote a report on its restoration with Webb, Lethaby and others in 1900, helped supervise the work, and saved the building from destruction.
His detailed survey of St Margaret's Church, Barking, written in 1928, illustrates his professional attention to detail, his practical advice on finding the right builder, and the order in which the work should be carried out. He also shows his consideration for the feelings of the church's clergy and congregation who might be unhappy at his suggestions. He gives an overall estimate of costs for the renovation works, and mentions other items for later attention, including organ maintenance, gutters, heating, lighting, tower, walls, altar and altar rails.
Continuing into his later life he advised SPAB on repairs to ancient buildings in Kent and Essex, and undertaking occasion architectural work, although by 1939 he was expressing his sadness about new trends that were doing damage to old buildings. According to Francis C Eeles, Secretary of the Central Council for the Care of Churches, Winmill steered a course between ensuring practical repairs while retaining as much of the original building as possible. Eeles states that Winmill did excellent work in bringing the old church at Chingford back into use when some people thought that it was beyond recovery and might be lost entirely. As an advisor for the Society in Essex and Kent, Winmill was able to promote good practice, and Eeles feels that Winmill himself being a churchman gave his work added meaning and sincerity. A similar assessment to that of Eeles came from a satisfied client, the Abbot of St Augustine's, Ramsgate, where Winmill advised on and supervised repairs to the Abbey school roof in 1934: the Abbot found Winmill to be a straightforward person of integrity, honesty and kindness, showing attention to detail in his work, and with a sense of humour.

Private work

An early private project which Winmill undertook while still with the LCC was for a 'House and Home' exhibition at the Whitechapel Art Gallery in the summer of 1911, organised by Philip Webb. The exhibits included examples of modern housing and 'homes of the past', for which Winmill created a full-sized model of the lower floor of a small house. A later exhibition project came in 1924, when he was involved in the planning of the 1888 room at the Palace of Arts, for the British Empire Exhibition at Wembley.
From about 1923 onwards, for about 20 years, Winmill did private work for Dent publishers, maintaining, adapting and extending the company's printing and binding works at Letchworth, Hertfordshire, as well as their office building in London. Another commission in Letchworth was for a canteen at the Temple Press, the opening of which he attended in December 1944.
Winmill also designed homes for friends, for example two houses in West Street, Reigate, Surrey in 1923, in Merriott, Somerset in 1924, and 88 Ossulton Way, Finchley, North London, a four-bedroom detached house completed in 1934.