painter and architect, arrived at Melbourne in 1856 and exhibited nine pastels with the Victorian Society of Fine Arts in 1857, all views of British and European shipwrecks, castles and picturesque scenery. Also included was his watercolour Design for a Church , possibly the Design for Presbyterian Church, City shown by R. Wilson, architect of 16 Bridge Street West, London, at the Royal Academy in 1850. (His subsequent partner, the Tasmanian-born architect Thomas James Crouch, referred to Wilson as a 'Gothic’ architect from London.) The pastels received most critical attention. 'Christopher Sly’ ( James Edward Neild ) described them as images 'in which curry-powder and brick-dust have been freely used’ and singled out Ruin in North Wales as an especially repellent 'union of Bathbrick, mouldy bread, and blue ruin’. Undeterred, Wilson showed three watercolours and three drawings of marine and shipwreck subjects at the 1869 Melbourne Public Library Exhibition.
In 1857 Wilson was at 51 Swanston Street, but the following year the successful architectural partnership of Crouch & Wilson was established at 49 Elizabeth Street. On 10 February 1859 Wilson married Anna Maria Roberts at St Kilda. By 1866 he was listed both as an architect in the Elizabeth Street firm and as an artist of Barkly Street, St Kilda. When the original principals died in the late 1880s the partnership continued under their respective sons until 1916.
The original firm designed and erected many churches (Crouch seems to have catered for the Wesleyan Methodists while Wilson attended to other denominations) as well as other public and institutional buildings, including the town halls at Malvern and Prahran (c.1861), the Deaf and Dumb Asylum and Blind Institute on St Kilda Road, Melbourne (1860s), and Lassetter’s, the largest hardware and general emporium in Sydney (1864). They also designed many private houses; a watercolour perspective of Mr Bonwick’s new residence in Barkly Street, St Kilda, survives (c.1865, National Library of Australia). They won several competitions, including those for the Empire Building in Collins Street and the Melbourne General Post Office (first prize £300), and they showed designs and photographs of their buildings at the 1861 Victorian and 1866 Melbourne Intercolonial exhibitions.
- Writers:
- Staff Writer
- Date written:
- 1992
- Last updated:
- 2011
