Eileen Harris
Eileen Joyce Harris was an American-British architectural historian and author. She was an expert on Robert Adam and was Honorary Librarian and Consultant to the Adam Project at Sir John Soane's Museum in London.
Early and family life
Eileen Joyce Spiegel was born in Brooklyn, New York, on 26 November 1932, to Paul Spiegel and Irene Stein. Eileen also had a younger brother, Michael Ivan Spiegel, who was a famous antitrust lawyer and also Deputy Attorney General of California for 25 years.Career
Harris was an internationally recognised Robert Adam scholar, having published extensively on the subject for over 40 years. Harris, along with Nicholas Savage, were the authors of on an integrated catalogue of Sir John Soane's art, architectural and general volumes and pamphlets in his library at Sir John Soane's Museum, to be made available online.Personal life and death
Harris married Englishman John Harris. Together they had a son, Lucian Guthrie, and a daughter, Georgina. Harris and her husband lived in London and Badminton, Gloucestershire. She died on 18 October 2025, at the age of 92.Books (in reverse chronology)
- From the Archives of Country Life, Aurum Press Ltd,,.
- Paul Mellon Centre for Studies, Yale University Press,,. Selected by Choice as a 2003 Outstanding Academic Title. Selected by Architects Journal as one of the Books of the Year.
- National Trust Guide Books,,.
- Rizzoli Intl Pubns,,.
- Scolar Press,,.
- with J. Mordaunt Crook and John Harris, Zwemmer,,.
- Chapters in Art Series, Tiranti,,.
Books - Exhibition Catalogues
- edited with Nicholas Savage, Sir John Soane's Museum.
Articles
- The Burlington Magazine, Vol 137, No 1103, February 1995, pp 68–75.
- Apollo, No 366, 1992, pp 83–86.
- Apollo, No 338, April 1990, part of pp 224–251.
- The Burlington Magazine, No 1031, 1989, p 101.
- The Burlington Magazine, Vol 128, No 998, May 1986, pp 340–346.
- Essays in the History of Architecture Presented to Rudolf Wittkower on his 65th birthday, edited by Douglas Fraser, Howard Hibbard and Milton J Lewine, Phaidon, London, pp 207–13.