Robert Lawson (architect)

Robert Arthur Lawson (1 January 1833 – 3 December 1902) was one of New Zealand's pre-eminent 19th century architects. It has been said he did more than any other designer to shape the face of the Victorian era architecture of the city of Dunedin. He is the architect of over forty churches, including Dunedin's First Church for which he is best remembered, but also other buildings, such as Larnach Castle, a country house, with which he is also associated.

Born at Newburgh, in Fife, Scotland, he emigrated in 1854 to Australia and then in 1862 to New Zealand. He died aged 69 in Canterbury, New Zealand. Lawson is acclaimed for his work in both the Gothic revival and classical styles of architecture. He was prolific, and while isolated buildings remain in Scotland and Australia, it is in the Dunedin area that most surviving examples can now be found.

Today he is held in high esteem in his adopted country. However, at the time of his death his reputation and architectural skills were still held in contempt by many following the partial collapse of his Seacliff Lunatic Asylum, at the time New Zealand's largest building. In 1900, shortly before his death, he returned to New Zealand from a self-imposed, ten-year exile to re-establish his name, but his sudden demise prevented a full rehabilitation of his reputation. The great plaudits denied him in his lifetime were not to come until nearly a century after his death, when the glories of Victorian architecture began again to be recognised and appreciated.

Lawson was the fourth child of James Lawson, a carpenter, and his wife, Margaret. The young Lawson was educated at the local parish school. He then studied architecture, first in Perth (Scotland) and later in Edinburgh under James Gillespie Graham. Aged 21, he emigrated first to Melbourne on 15 July 1854, on the ship Tongataboo. Like other new arrivals in Australia, he tried many new occupations, including goldmining and journalism. During this period he occasionally turned his hand to architecture. In Steiglitz he designed the Free Church school and in 1858 a Catholic school. As Lawson came to realise the low probability of success in the gold rush and the precariousness of a career in journalism, he decided to return full-time to his first chosen career and found a position as an architect in Melbourne.

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