Walter Bagot (architect)

Walter Hervey Bagot (17 March 1880 – 27 July 1963) was a South Australian architect. He was one of the last great proponents of the traditional school of South Australian architecture, and remained unconvinced by Modernism. He founded Woods & Bagot in 1905.[1]

Early life

Bagot was born in North Adelaide, the son of pastoralist John Bagot MHA, and Lucy Josephine Ayers; his grandfathers were Charles Hervey Bagot[2] and Sir Henry Ayers[3] He was educated at the Collegiate School of St Peter and apprenticed to the architect E. J. Woods for four years.

In 1902 Bagot went to England where he studied architecture at King's College London, won the silver medal of the Worshipful Company of Carpenters and in 1904 gained associateship of the Royal Institute of British Architects.

In 1905 he returned to Adelaide and formed the firm of Woods & Bagot (later Woods, Bagot, Laybourne-Smith & Irwin). He purchased the McMinn-designed Waterhouse House on North Terrace in 1906, selling it in 1926. On 18 November 1908 at St Peter's Cathedral, Adelaide, he married Josephine Margaret Barritt (1889-1946), a granddaughter of Joseph Barritt. They lived at "Forest Lodge", a house near Aldgate built by Walter Bagot's father, John Bagot. The couple had three children,[4] one being John Hervey Bagot (1910–2008), a prominent lawyer.

Selected works

Architect

• Barr Smith Library, University of Adelaide
• Bonython Hall (1936), University of Adelaide
• 1924 design for the National War Memorial (South Australia) (Design destroyed by fire.)

Assistant

• St. Francis Xavier's Cathedral (1905–26)
• St Peters Cathedral (1907–45)

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  Barr Smith Library
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  Bonython Hall
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  National War Memorial
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References

1. Berry, Dean W. (1979). "Bagot, Walter Hervey (1880 - 1963)". Australian Dictionary of Biography. Melbourne University Press. ISSN 1833-7538. Retrieved 1 February 2009 – via National Centre of Biography, Australian National University.
2. Bagot, Charles Hervey (1788-1880), Australian Dictionary of Biography, Volume 1, Melbourne University Press, 1966, pp 47-48.
3. S. R. Parr, Ayers, Sir Henry (1821-1897), Australian Dictionary of Biography, Volume 3, Melbourne University Press, 1969, pp 63-64.
4. Josephine Margaret Barritt, www.austlit.edu.au