Dictionary of Irish Architects 1720 - 1940

English architect and author of architectural pattern books, for whom see Howard Colvin, A Biographical dictionary of British architects 1600-1840 (4th edn., 2008), 467-469. During the 1730s William Halfpenny (who also used the alias Michael Hoare) was engaged in various works in Ireland.  He may possibly have worked as an assistant to EDWARD LOVETT PEARCE EDWARD LOVETT PEARCE ;  Eileen Harris notes that in his New and Compleat System of Architecture (1749)  Halfpenny 'drew mainly upon his experience of moderate-sized houses in Ireland by architects like Edward Lovett Pearce and Richard Cassels'(1) and that his designs in The Modern Builder's Assistant (1757) show 'even more evidence of a connection with Edward Lovett Pearce and Ireland than his designs in A New and Compleat System'.(2) Did Halfpenny have family connections in Ireland? See NICHOLAS HALFPENNY. NICHOLAS HALFPENNY.

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References



(1) Frank Keohane (e-mail of 25 May 2009) points out the similarity of the house with the pyramidal roof in Plate 15 to Woodlands, Santry, Co. Dublin, built before 1735 and atttributed by Maurice Craig to Pearce (Classic Irish Houses of the Middle Size (London, 1976),77).
(2) Eileen Harris, British Architectural Books and Writers 1556-1785 (1990), 219,222.


10 work entries listed in chronological order for HALFPENNY, WILLIAM #


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Building: CO. WESTMEATH, GAULSTOWN
Date: 1730ca
Nature: Attr. to Pearce or William Halfpenny by Casey & Rowan.
Refs: Christine Casey & Alistair Rowan, The Buildings of Ireland: North Leinster (1993), 196-7(illus.)

Building: CO. DOWN, HILLSBOROUGH, HORSE BARRACKS
Date: 1732
Nature: For 1st Viscount Hillsborough.
Refs: C.E.B. Brett, Court Houses and Market Houses of the Province of Ulster (UAHS, 1973), 73

Building: CO. DUBLIN, DUBLIN, COLLEGE GREEN, TRINITY COLLEGE, LIBRARY (OLD)
Date: 1733-34
Nature: WH measures painting work and work on ceiling in room above MS room.
Refs: Trinity College muniments, MUN/P/2/59(14),67(3); Anne Crookshank, The Long Room (Gatherum 6, 1976), 2,3,5

Building: CO. CARLOW, GARRYHUNDON HOUSE
Date: 1734
Nature: For Sir Richard? Butler, Bt.
Refs: Signed and dated elevation in private collection, London (photocopy in IAA, Jones file H8a)

Building: CO. WATERFORD, WATERFORD, OLAVE'S STREET, ST OLAVE'S CHURCH (CI)
Date: 1734
Nature: Possible attribution to WH.
Refs: Catalogue of the Drawings Collection of the Royal Institute of British Architects, G-K (1973), 83.

Building: CO. KILKENNY, KILKENNY, CHURCH LANE, BISHOP'S PALACE
Date: 1735p
Nature: The design for the entrance doorcase of this building is taken from Plate 26 of Practical Architecture, first published in 1724 by William Halfpenny, who entitles the plate 'A Rustick Door from Palladio much used by the Modern Architects'.  As a pattern-book design this does not imply that Halfpenny had any direct association with the building, although he appears to have made a ground plan of Kilkenny cathedral  perhaps in the late 1730s (see Terry Friedman, 'William Halfpenny's designs for an 'Early Christian' cathedral at Waterford'. Irish Architectural and Decorative Studies 1 (1998), 30,n.26).
Refs: Information from Colm Murray, Heritage Council of Ireland, Aug 2020.

Building: CO. WATERFORD, WATERFORD, CATHEDRAL SQUARE, BISHOP'S PALACE
Date: 1739
Nature: Unexecuted designs possibly for Bishop's Palace for Thomas Milles, Bishop of Waterford, in RIBA Drawings Collection.
Refs: Catalogue of the Drawings Collection of the Royal Institute of British Architects, G-K (1973), 82-3; John Harris, The Palladians (RIBA Drawings Series, 1982), 100(illus.)

Building: CO. WATERFORD, WATERFORD, CATHEDRAL SQUARE, CHRIST CHURCH CATHEDRAL (CI)
Date: 1739
Nature: Signed and dated survey plan and unexecuted designs for Palladian vernacular replacement in RIBA drawings collection; other drawings in NLI.
Refs: Catalogue of the Drawings Collection of the Royal Institute of British Architects G-K (1973), 82-3; John Harris, The Palladians (RIBA Drawings Series, 1982), 99(illus.); for drawings (3 signed) in NLI, see Rosalind M. Elmes, National Library of Ireland: Catalogue of Irish topographical prints and original drawings (2nd ed., 1975), 138 (no. 1977TX);  Terry Friedman, 'William Halfpenny's designs for an 'Early Christian' cathedral at Waterford'. Irish Architectural and Decorative Studies 1 (1998), 8-33.

Building: CO. CORK, CORK, CORNMARKET STREET, CORN MARKET (OLD)
Date: 1739
Nature: WH paid 40s. 'for the draft he made of the Cornmarket'.
Refs: R. Caulfield, ed., Council Book of the Corporation of Cork (1876), 585

Building: CO. ROSCOMMON, BOYLE, KING HOUSE
Date: ?
Nature: 'probably by William Halfpenny, an assistant of Sir Edward Lovett Pearce' for Henry King, MP. On Craig's 'list of candidates for buildings in some way connected to Pearce'.
Refs: Mark Bence-Jones, Burke’s Guide to Country Houses. Volume I, Ireland. (London, 1978), 177(illus.); Maurice Craig, 'The quest for Sir Edward Lovett Pearce', Irish Arts Review Yearbook 12 (1996), 33