EDMUND BLACKET

'Edmund Thomas Blacket' (25 August 1817 – 9 February 1883) was an Australian architect, best known for his designs for Sydney University and Sydney Cathedral.

Contents

Early Life

Architect in Australia

List of Works

Reference

External Links

Early Life

Edmund Blacket was the son of James Blacket a prosperous slopseller or draper of Smithfield, London, and his wife Margaret Harriot Ralph, and was born at 85 St Margaret's Hill (later Borough High Street) Southwark. He was raised in a strict Congregational atmosphere and educated at Mill Hill School, a Congregational college, near Barnet. On leaving school he went into his father's office and three years later, at the age of 20, took a position in a linen mill in Stokesley Yorkshire. This mill was owned by his father in partnership with a Thomas Mease. However the Blackets closed the partnership with Mease in July 1837 as they were unhappy about certain financial matters, and by March 1838, the whole business was in Chancery. However Edmund had fallen in love with Mease's daughter Sarah and earned his father's displeasure by marrying her in May 1842. Edmund was much interested in architecture and spent his holidays sketching and measuring old buildings, but his father opposed his taking up this profession, and in June 1842 Blacket and his new wife left England intending to settle in New Zealand. He had letters of introduction to prominent residents of Sydney, including Sir Charles Nicholson, Thomas Sutcliffe Mort and Bishop William Grant Broughton

Architect in Australia

Soon after his arrival in Australia in November 1842, Blacket obtained a position as an inspector of buildings and teacher in the Church of England schools, and decided to stay. Edmund started designing churches and houses at least from 1843. Some of the earliest churches he was involved with were St John's Ashfield (1843), St Mary's Balmain (1843) and St Paul's Carcoar (1845).
In 1847 Blacket was officially appointed Diocesan Architect for the Church of England, while still continuing with his private practice. In January 1849 he took in an articled pupil, William Kemp who was later to become an architect of some note, and in 1850 he was appointed Colonial Architect for New South Wales. His salary was only £300 a year and the discovery of gold having caused much increase in the price of living, Blacket in 1854 resigned from the public service and began private practice. He had been promised the main building for the University of Sydney, which was begun at the end of that year and finished about 1860. The main front measures 125 metres (410 feet) in length, and has a tower in the centre 27 m (90 feet) high. The great hall, a beautifully proportioned piece of work at the right hand end, is 41 m (135 feet) by 14 m (45 feet), with an open-timbered roof 21 m (70 feet) from the floor. The Senate is said to have asked him to sign his buildings, and as a result the Blacket arms are to be seen on the south wall of the main wing, completed about 1860. Blacket was also responsible for the St Paul's College building.
Blacket became established as a leading architect in Sydney and was especially known for his churches. Among these may be mentioned St. Andrew's Cathedral, Sydney, for which he was not entirely responsible; Goulburn cathedral; St Phillp's, Sydney; St Thomas's, North Sydney; St Mark's, Darling Point; St John's, Glebe; St Stephen's, Newtown; St Paul's, Burwood and St John's, Ashfield. He was also responsible for the completion of St John's College, University of Sydney, carrying on after Wardel resigned. It is possibly regrettable that he was not asked to work out a plan for later university buildings, but it is likely that the immense development of the university would have caused such a plan to have had little value. Blacket died suddenly at Sydney on 9 February 1883. His wife died many years before and there was a large family. One of his sons, Cyril Blacket, born in 1857, was in partnership with his father, afterwards designed the chapter-house for St Andrew's cathedral, and was elected president of the Institute of Architects, New South Wales, in 1903.
Blacket was a remarkable example of a self-taught architect. He began his work at a bad period, and there was little beyond his natural good taste and his drawings of old Gothic buildings to guide him. The facade of the university building remains one of the finest pieces of Gothic in Australia, and though objection has been taken to a want of proportion between his towers and spires and the churches to which they are attached, his works have still a high place among the buildings of the period. Personally he was a man of the strictest probity with a great love for his profession, and also had many various recreational activities. He studied the classics, and was considered the leading authority on Greek in Sydney, loved music, playing the organ at the temporary wooden pro-Cathedral, was a wood carver and an amateur mechanical engineer. Most of Edmund's brothers and sisters remained in England, and descendents include his great nephews Lord Blackett and Sir Basil Blackett.

List of Works

Blacket is said to have designed, or contributed to the design of 116 Churches (although only 79 are confirmed built), 40 houses, 4 Cathedrals and a great many other assorted buildings and structures. A partial list of his designs would include:

★ St John's College, University of Sydney

★ St John's Church, Glebe

★ St Paul's College, University of Sydney

★ St Jude's Church, Randwick

★ St Andrew's Cathedral, Sydney

★ St Phillip's Church, Sydney

★ St Thomas's Church, Nth Sydney

★ St Mark's Church, Darling Point

★ St Stephen's Church, Newtown

★ St Paul's Church, Burwood

★ St John's Church, Ashfield

★ St Paul's Church, Redfern

★ All Saints, Woollahra

★ St Stephen's Church, Willoughby

★ Hunter Baillie Presbyterian Church, Annandale

★ St John's Church, Wollombi

★ St Paul's Church, Carcoar

★ St Peter's Church, Watsons Bay

★ St Michael's Church, Surry Hills

★ St Michael's Church, Vaucluse

★ Bishopscourt, Darling Point

★ Presbyterian Church, East Sydney

Reference

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External Links

★ Australian Dictionary of Biography

★ The Blacketts of North East England