Thomas Archer (1668–1743) was an English Baroque architect. His buildings are important as the only ones by an English Baroque architect to show evidence of study of contemporary continental, namely Italian, architecture. It is said that his work is somewhat overshadowed by that of his contemporaries, who include Sir John Vanbrugh and Nicholas Hawksmoor.
Life Archer spent his youth at Umberslade Hall in Tanworth-in-Arden in Warwickshire, the youngest son of Thomas Archer, a country gentleman, Parliamentary Colonel and Member of Parliament, and Ann Leigh, daughter of the London haberdasher, Richard Leigh.The Little London Directory of 1677: the oldest printed list of the merchants and bankers of London. Edited by John Camden Hotton, 1863. A reprint of A Collection of the Names of Merchants living in and about the City of London, 11 October 1677, under licence from Roger L'Estrange. Richard Leigh and his wife Mary had six children, of which Ann was the eldest. The family lived in the parish of St. Helen's Bishopgate. Ann married Thomas Archer, the architect's father in 1649 in the parish of St. Peter-le-Poor. The exact date of Archer's birth is unknown, but can be inferred from the two documentary sources that mention his age. One is an entry in the Oxford University register recording his matriculation at Trinity College on 12 June 1686, aged 17; the other, his epitaph, survives in the parish church of Hale, Hampshire. If these records are accurate, he must have been born between 12 June 1668 and 22 May 1669. Thomas is the only one of the Archer children not to have his birth recorded in the Tamworth-in-Arden parish register, which suggests he may have been born elsewhere.Joseph Foster, Alumni Oxonienses: The Members of the University of Oxford, 1500–1714 (Oxford: James Parker & Co., 189 1). Marcus Whiffen, Thomas Archer, vol. 3 (London: Art and Technics, 1950). Marcus Whiffen, Thomas Archer, architect of the English baroque, [New ed.] ed. (Los Angeles: Hennessey & Ingalls, 1973).
He attended Trinity College, Oxford, from which he matriculated on 12 June 1686.Thomas Archer Architect of the English Baroque, Marcus Whiffen, 1973, Art and Technics. p.10 After leaving university, he went on a Grand Tour, spending four years abroad, including in Italy and his subsequent architectural work was influenced by Bernini and Borromini. His first wife Eleanor, who he married in 1701, died the following year and he later married Ann Chaplin, having no children from either of his marriages. Archer was appointed groom porter in 1705, a lucrative position that gave him the ability to license gambling premises and run his own tables when the gambling houses were closed, and William Cavendish, 1st Duke of Devonshire, commissioned him to work on Chatsworth House. Given Archer's status, his work is relatively rare, and it appears that he only designed when he desired to do so. Archer purchased the manor of Hale, and built Hale Park. Archer was appointed comptroller of Newcastle customs in 1715, after which his architectural work appears to have reduced. He died in London on 23 May 1743.
Churches Among Archer's churches is grade I listed St John Evangelist, Westminster, suggestive of Hawksmoor's baroque influence. When Archer asked Queen Anne how she wanted it to look, she apparently kicked over a stool and responded "like that!", with the resulting four towers resembling an upside down footstool, and the building subsequently nicknamed 'Queen Anne's Footstool'. Oscar Wilde once described the building as "some petrified monster, frightful and gigantic, on its back with its legs in the air”. The towers were influenced by Borromini’s Sant’Agnese. The building is considered one of the most important examples of English Baroque architecture. Designed and built between 1712 and 1730, grade I listed St Paul's, Deptford, sweeping semi-circular porticos were not copied for a century until Smirke's magnificent church at St Mary's, Bryanston Square that dominated the street. John Betjeman describes it as being "a pearl at the heart of Deptford", and it is influenced by two Italian churches, with Borromini’s work on Sant'Agnese inspiring the interior, and the work of Pietro da Cortona at Santa Maria della Pace. At St Philip's, Birmingham, now Birmingham Cathedral there was a strong sense of the Italianate Lombardic influences of High Baroque style of churches: ornate, high ceilings, with cupola and dome. External to St Philips is the roof balustrade quite unusual in English church architecture.G.Cobb, The Old Churches of London (1942), p.96 St John's and St Paul's were both built for the Commission for Building Fifty New Churches. John Summerson said these two buildings "represent the most advanced Baroque style ever attempted in England". According to the minutes of the Commissioners, Archer also "improved" Hawksmoor's designs for St Alfege's at Greenwich, although the nature of the improvements, or whether they were implemented, is unknown. Downes suggests the use of the giant order of pilasters around the church may have been Archer's idea.
At Hale, Hampshire, he remodelled St Mary's Church, which also contains his memorial, carved by Sir Henry Cheere to Archer's own design.
Secular works Archer's secular works included Roehampton House, Welford Park in Berkshire, and the Cascade House and the west front and broadly bowed pilastered north front at Chatsworth House. In 1709–11 Archer designed a Baroque garden pavilion for Henry Grey, 1st Duke of Kent at Wrest Park, Silsoe, Bedfordshire. After 1712 Archer designed Hurstbourne Priors in Hampshire for John Wallop (later Earl of Portsmouth).
He was a founding governor of the Foundling Hospital in London in 1739, but was not involved in the construction of the resulting building, completed . The architect for that project was Theodore Jacobsen.
Documented works Chatsworth House, North front, Derbyshire, Heythrop Hall, Oxfordshire, St Philip's, Birmingham, 1708–1715 Garden pavilion, Wrest Park, Bedfordshire, 1709–1711 Roehampton House, Surrey, 1712 Cliveden House, Service pavilions and the quadrant colonnades, Buckinghamshire Hurstbourne Priors, Hampshire, 1712 St John’s, Smith Square, London, 1713–1728 St. Paul's, Deptford, 1712–1730 Hale Park, Hampshire, 1715, designed for himself. St Mary’s Church, additions, Hale, Hampshire, 1717 Harcourt House, Cavendish Square, London, 1722
Attributed works Welford Park, remodelling of house, Berkshire, 1700 Chicheley Hall, Buckinghamshire, Parish church, chancel, Chicheley, 1708 Addiscombe House, Croydon, Surrey, Monmouth House, Soho Square, London, 1703 Russell House, King Street, Covent Garden, London, Cascade House, Chatsworth House, Derbyshire, 1705 Hill House, Cain Hill, Wrest Park, Bedfordshire, , demolished Bramham Park, Yorkshire, Kingston Maurward, Dorset, 1717–1720 Marlow Place, Buckinghamshire, 1720 Chettle House, Dorset, Monument to Susannah Thomas, Hampton Church, Middlesex, Archer Memorial, St Mary’s Church, Hale, Hampshire Thomas Archer (his father) monument, St Mary Magdalene's Church, Tanworth-in-Arden, Warwickshire
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Further reading *Helen Lawrence, New Light on Thomas Archer as a Garden-Maker in Garden History Journal, Vol 38. No 1 (2010). p. 50-65
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