page_title: Robert Mylne (architect)
section_title: Architecture
hierarchical_section_title: Robert Mylne (architect) / Architecture
context_page_description: Robert Mylne was a Scottish architect and civil engineer, particularly remembered for his design for Blackfriars Bridge in London. Born and raised in Edinburgh, he travelled to Europe as a young man, studying architecture in Rome under Piranesi. In 1758 he became the first Briton to win the triennial architecture competition at the Accademia di San Luca, which made his name known in London, and won him the rivalry of fellow Scot Robert Adam.
  On his return to Britain, Mylne won the competition to design the new Blackfriars Bridge over the Thames in London, his design being chosen over those of established engineers, such as John Smeaton. He was appointed surveyor to the New River Company, which supplied drinking water to London, and Surveyor of the Fabric of St Paul's Cathedral, where he was responsible for maintaining the building designed by Sir Christopher Wren. Both positions he held for life. Mylne designed a number of country houses and city buildings, as well as bridges. As his career progressed he concentrated more on engineering, writing reports on harbours and advising on canals, and appearing as an expert witness in lawsuits and trials.
context_section_description: Despite these early successes, Mylne never won the acclaim of his contemporaries Robert Adam (1728–1792) and William Chambers (1723–1796). Although he became a successful architect, he played only a minor role in the development of neoclassical architecture, which was led by Adam and Chambers. Mylne followed the French style of neoclassicism, rather than the "Adam style", and his work was also influenced by the post-Palladian buildings of English architect Isaac Ware (1704–1766). Mylne's influence on British architecture was limited, although the Irish architect Thomas Cooley (1740–1784) was Mylne's clerk at Blackfriars, and later produced designs which show the influence of Mylne's competition-winning Rome design.
  Mylne designed a number of town houses and country houses, and a few public buildings. The first new country house was Cally, in Galloway, south-west Scotland, for James Murray of Broughton. Mylne had met Murray in Rome, and drew a set of plans while still there, although the house was built to a modified design. His largest country house was Tusmore, Oxfordshire, built in a Palladian style between 1766 and 1769 for William Fermor. Of his small town houses, the most successful is The Wick, in Richmond. Designed in 1775 for Lady St Aubyn, the house has oval dining and drawing rooms. From 1794 to 1797 Mylne built a house for himself, The Grove, at Great Amwell.
  St Cecilia's Hall in Edinburgh was one of Mylne's first public buildings, built 1761–1763 for the Musical Society of Edinburgh. The oval, domed hall survives as part of Edinburgh University. Mylne's design for the City of London Lying-in Hospital, built 1770–1773, comprised a high central cupola flanked by pedimented blocks. Another public building, Stationers' Hall in London, was among his last architectural works, being refronted by him in 1800.
  One or Mylne's earliest works for a private client was for Edward Southwell (1705–1755) whom he is reputed to have met in Rome when Southwell was on the Grand Tour and Mylne was there studying under Piranesi. Mylne's first work at Kings Weston House was in 1763 and involved designing and extensive new stables and kitchen garden complex which still remain. In the years following Mylne worked on extensively modernising Kings Weston House and replacing Sir John Vanbrugh's austere interiors. Here he created a suite of neo-classical rooms surrounding the remodelled Sallon which he filled with family portraits in refined carved architectural surrounds. His final work for Southwell was for a lodge house in 1768, the drawing for which he gave to his client.
  In 1766, Mylne was appointed Surveyor to St Paul's Cathedral, completed by Sir Christopher Wren some 55 years earlier. Nominated by the Lord Mayor of London, his salary was £50 a year. In this capacity, Mylne was responsible for erecting a monument to Wren, whose only memorial at the time was in the basement. The existing Latin epitaph, Lector, si monumentum requiris, circumspice (reader, if you seek his monument, look around you), was re-used on a tablet mounted on the organ screen in 1810, although this was destroyed in the Blitz. He purchased over 200 of Wren's drawings, with his own money, and had them bound and presented to the Cathedral, thus recording the building's history for posterity. On the death of Lord Nelson at Trafalgar in 1805, Mylne was partly responsible for the state funeral, building Nelson's sarcophagus in the Cathedral basement, although the design of the monument fell to James Wyatt of the Office of Works. Mylne, together with the manufacturer Matthew Boulton, arranged for a secret deposit of commemorative medals, of Boulton's making, to be placed inside the sarcophagus prior to Nelson's interment.
  In November 1775 he was also appointed clerk of works at Greenwich Hospital, another Wren building, under the surveyor James Stuart. At Greenwich he cleared unsightly workshops from the grounds, and laid out a series of walkways. He was later accused by the Lieutenant Governor, Captain Baillie, of misusing funds and occupying space required by the H
caption: Mylne's drawing of King William's Court, Greenwich Hospital
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