William Hosking

William Hosking (26 November 1800 – 2 August 1861) was an English writer, lecturer, and architect who had an important influence on the growth and development of London in Victorian times. He became the first Professor of Architecture at King's College London, and associated this discipline in a scholarly fashion with interests in town planning, civil engineering, history and antiquities.

Hosking was born at Buckfastleigh in Devon, the son of a woolen manufacturer. In 1809 he emigrated with his parents to New South Wales (which joined the federation of Australia in 1901), where his father, whose business interests in Devon had been doing poorly, had accepted a government office. It was here that Hosking's architectural career began for he was apprenticed to a surveyor and builder. This profession continued to interest him when, in 1819, he returned to England to seek further training, becoming articled to a Wesleyan minister-turned-architect, the Rev. William Jenkins.

In the early 1820s Hosking completed his articles and travelled in southern Europe, including Italy; primarily to study art and architecture with Jenkins's son John. This subsequently led to his exhibiting drawings at the Royal Academy (including "Temple of Concord, Agrigentum" and "Temple of Neptune at Paestum") and provided original material for his first book: A Selection of Architectural and Other Ornaments, Greek, Roman and Italian drawn from the originals in various museums and buildings in Italy, published in 1827. Such scholarship led to his being elected a Fellow of the Society of Antiquaries in 1830. At about this date he was also commissioned by the Encyclopædia Britannica, to contribute the chapters headed "Architecture" and "Building", later to be supplemented with "The Drainage of Towns".

His interest in antiquities—in particular scholarly observation of the architectural details of historic buildings—became reinforced by his membership of the forerunner of the Royal Historical Society, the Camden Society. Indeed historical accuracy came to characterise Hosking's approach to architecture, as he sought to mix historical elements in appropriate ways. This eye for historical detail was combined with a concern for equally detailed practical improvements in construction techniques (such as fire retardation, damp proofing, and other aspects of what has become known today as a branch of civil engineering known as building control).

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