Walter Newall

Walter Newall (3 April 1780 - 25 December 1863) was a Scottish architect, born at Doubledyke in the parish of New Abbey, near Dumfries in south-west Scotland. He was the leading architect in the Dumfries area, from the 1820s until his retirement.Colvin, Howard, (1978) "A Biographical Dictionary of British Architects, 1600–1840", John Murray, pp.697-699]

Newall began his design career in partnership with an upholsterer and a cabinet maker in the Dumfries firm of Newall, Hannah and Reid. Nothing is known of any architectural training, although Howard Colvin suggests that his knowledge of up-to-date styles points to time spent with an architect of standing. Throughout his working life he lived mainly in Dumfries, travelling around Dumfriesshire, Kirkcudbrightshire and Wigtownshire in the course of his work. His papers show him to have made tours of Germany and Italy, as well as parts of England, notably Oxford, Cambridge and Fonthill. Newall died at Craigend, New Abbey, on Christmas Day, 1863. An extensive archive of Newall's sketchbooks, drawings and plans have survived and were purchased by Dumfries Museum in the spring of 1991.

His built works include villas at Cardoness (1828), for Sir David Maxwell, Baronet, and Glenlair, Corsock (1830), home of mathematician and theoretical physicist James Clerk Maxwell. In Dumfries, Newall built Moat Brae (1832), whose gardens, a childhood haunt of author J. M. Barrie, were the inspiration for Peter Pan. Newall remodelled a windmill as a neoclassical observatory, which later became the town museum. He also designed several Gothic churches, including those at Buittle (1818-19), Anwoth (1826-27), and Kirkpatrick Durham (1849-50). His Greek Revival-style villas were admired by J. C. Loudon, and featured in his "Encyclopedia of Cottage, Farm, Villa Architecture" (1834).

References

*cite web |url=http://www.codexgeo.co.uk/dsa/architect_full.php?id=M000326 |title=Walter Newall |work=Dictionary of Scottish Architects 1840-1940 |accessdate=2008-06-30