Percy Erskine Nobbs belongs to the record of architecture as a figure whose buildings outlasted the taste that commissioned them.
The record lists Percy Erskine Nobbs as Canadian architect (1875-1964).
Percy Erskine Nobbs was born at Haddington in 1875. His recorded nationality is Canada. He trained at University of Edinburgh and Edinburgh Collegiate School.
Industrialisation gave architecture iron, glass and the lift, and with them the problems of the railway station, the factory and the tall city block.
He is recorded as architect and fencer.
Among his best-known works are McCord Stewart Museum, Percival Molson Memorial Stadium and Royal Montreal Curling Club. Architecture is the art that cannot be avoided: people live inside the argument.
Recognition followed: Member of the Royal Canadian Academy of Arts and Person of National Historic Significance.
That the work was built in Canada shaped it: climate, materials, planning law and who holds the budget all decide what can actually be built.
Percy Erskine Nobbs died in 1964, aged 89. The buildings remain, still in use by people who never knew the name - which is the particular afterlife architecture offers.
Achievements
- Notable work: McCord Stewart Museum
- Notable work: Percival Molson Memorial Stadium
- Notable work: Royal Montreal Curling Club
- Member of the Royal Canadian Academy of Arts
- Person of National Historic Significance
- Trained at University of Edinburgh and Edinburgh Collegiate School
