page_title: Egyptian Revival architecture in the British Isles
section_title: Egyptian Library, Devonport
hierarchical_section_title: Egyptian Revival architecture in the British Isles / Examples / Egyptian Library, Devonport
caption_attribution_description: John Foulston's Town Hall, Column and Library in Devonport, Devon, UK in 2008. Taken from almost the same spot as this 1820's engraving.
context_page_description: Egyptian Revival architecture in the British Isles is a survey of motifs derived from Ancient Egyptian sources occurring as an architectural style. Egyptian Revival architecture is comparatively rare in the British Isles. Obelisks start appearing in the 17th century, mainly as decorative features on buildings and by the 18th century they started to be used in some numbers as funerary or commemorative monuments. In the later 18th century, mausoleums started to be built based on pyramids, and sphinxes were used as decorative features associated with monuments or mounted on gate piers. The pylon, a doorway feature with spreading jambs which support a lintel, also started to be used and became popular with architects.
  As a result of the Napoleonic conquest of Egypt in 1798, more accurate records became available to architects and Egyptian Revival became a recognised architectural style. As the 19th century progressed Egyptian features were, on occasions, used for industrial buildings and particularly for suspension bridges, and after 1830 the Egyptian Revival style was often used for cemetery buildings and monuments in cemeteries.
context_section_description: John Foulston (1772 – 30 December 1841)  was a pupil of Thomas Hardwick and set up a practice in London in 1796. In 1810 he won a competition to design the Royal Hotel and Theatre group of buildings in Plymouth, Devon, and after relocating he remained Plymouth's leading architect for twenty-five years.
  Most of Foulston's work was in the Greek Revival style, but his best known project was the creation of a group of buildings in Ker Street, Devonport in 1821–24. This eclectic group consisted of a Greek Doric town hall and commemorative column; a terrace of houses in Roman Corinthian style and two houses in Greek Ionic; a "Hindoo" nonconformist chapel; and an "Egyptian" library. The Library became the Odd Fellows Hall, and today is a public House. Of these, all but the chapel and the houses survive, and are Grade I listed.
caption: Same view in 2008
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