George Kay Green (3 May 1877 – December 1939) was a Scottish architect whose work after 1918 was mostly in southern England.

Life

Born in May 1877,1939 National Registration Act register for 241 Richmond Road, Twickenham
at ancestry.co.uk, accessed 18 April 2020 Green was educated at

George Watson's College George Watson's College is a co-educational Independent school (United Kingdom), independent day school in Scotland, situated on Colinton Road, in the Merchiston area of Edinburgh. It was first established as a Scottish education in the eight ...

Edinburgh Edinburgh ( ; gd, Dùn Èideann ) is the capital city of Scotland and one of its 32 Council areas of Scotland, council areas. Historically part of the county of Midlothian (interchangeably Edinburghshire before 1921), it is located in Lothian ...

,''A memorial record of Watsonians who served in the great war 1914'' (George Watson's College, Edinburgh, 1920), p. 1063: "GREEN George Kay 1, Walpole St, S.W.3 ... GREEN, GEORGE KAY 1877 ; entd. 1880 ; R.E. (C. of E.), Q.M.S. ; R.A.S.C., 2/Lt. 1917." and was active in business in Edinburgh from at least 1897, when he went into partnership there with William H. McLachlan. While no trace of Green's formal training as an architect has come to light,George Kay Green
at themodernhouse.com in 1899 he submitted designs for a new Upper Hall at the Signet Library, and was described as "George Kay Green, Architect". He was then of 42, Blacket Place, Edinburgh. A drawing by Green of the Laigh Hall, Edinburgh, appeared in the 1902 volume of the journal ''Judicial Review''. Green was in Edinburgh in 1909, when he wrote from there to ''The Berwick Advertiser'' on the subject of farming in the Borders. During the

First World War World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, the United States, and the Ottoman Empire, with fightin ...

, he served as a

quartermaster sergeant Quartermaster sergeant (QMS) is a class of rank or appointment in some armed forces, especially those of the United Kingdom and the Commonwealth, and formerly also in the United States. Ireland Quartermaster sergeant () appointments in the Iri ...

in the

Royal Engineers The Corps of Royal Engineers, usually called the Royal Engineers (RE), and commonly known as the ''Sappers'', is a corps of the British Army. It provides military engineering and other technical support to the British Armed Forces and is heade ...

and then was commissioned as a second lieutenant into the

Royal Army Service Corps The Royal Army Service Corps (RASC) was a corps of the British Army responsible for land, coastal and lake transport, air despatch, barracks administration, the Army Fire Service, staffing headquarters' units, supply of food, water, fuel and dom ...

. In 1920, he was living at 1, Walpole St, London S.W.3. In 1927, Green was a director of Peacehaven Estates Ltd, Peacehaven Hotel Company Ltd, Peacehaven Water Company Ltd, and Peacehaven Electric Light Company Ltd., which had an address at South Coast Road,

Peacehaven Peacehaven is a town and civil parish in the Lewes district of East Sussex, England. It is located above the chalk cliffs of the South Downs approximately six miles () east of Brighton city centre, on the A259 road. Its site coincides with the ...

, Sussex. In 1928 the companies also had an office at 7, Pall Mall,

Westminster Westminster is an area of Central London, part of the wider City of Westminster. The area, which extends from the River Thames to Oxford Street, has many visitor attractions and historic landmarks, including the Palace of Westminster, Bu ...

, and the directors were Lord Teynham (chairman), C. W. Neville (managing director), and Green. Peacehaven was a large self-build development described in 1940 as "a holiday resort or bungalow-town... founded at the end of the War of 1914–18. It lies at the edge of the cliffs, its plan being a grid of unmade roads". In London, Green began to specialize in designing large apartment blocks. He was the architect of

Sloane Avenue Mansions Sloane Avenue Mansions is a high-rise residential building in Sloane Avenue, Chelsea, London, England. It stands next to Nell Gwynn House, designed by the same architect. History At the beginning of the 20th century, the area comprised derelict h ...

, an 11-storey Art Deco residential building in

Chelsea, London Chelsea is an affluent area in west London, England, due south-west of Charing Cross by approximately 2.5 miles. It lies on the north bank of the River Thames and for postal purposes is part of the south-western postal area. Chelsea histori ...

, built between 1931 and 1933. Another such building he designed was Du Cane Court, Balham High Road,

Balham Balham () is an area in south London, England, mostly within the London Borough of Wandsworth with small parts within the neighbouring London Borough of Lambeth. The area has been settled since Saxon times and appears in the Domesday Book as B ...

, an early example of an apartment block with revolving doors, the largest block of flats in Great Britain when it was completed in 1934. Perhaps his final major building was

Nell Gwynn House Nell Gwynn House is a ten-storey residential building in Sloane Avenue, Chelsea, London, designed in the Art Deco style by G. Kay Green. Completed in 1937, it stands next to the same architect's Sloane Avenue Mansions, built a few years earlier. ...

in Sloane Avenue,

Chelsea Chelsea or Chelsey may refer to: Places Australia * Chelsea, Victoria Canada * Chelsea, Nova Scotia * Chelsea, Quebec United Kingdom * Chelsea, London, an area of London, bounded to the south by the River Thames ** Chelsea (UK Parliament consti ...

, which was finished in 1937. The footprint of the building forms a capital W, and it makes use of

Cubist Cubism is an early-20th-century avant-garde art movement that revolutionized European painting and sculpture, and inspired related movements in music, literature and architecture. In Cubist artwork, objects are analyzed, broken up and reassemble ...

geometric designs, with ancient Egyptian, Aztec, and Mayan patterns.

Private life

In May 1930, at

Brighton Brighton () is a seaside resort and one of the two main areas of the City of Brighton and Hove in the county of East Sussex, England. It is located south of London. Archaeological evidence of settlement in the area dates back to the Bronze A ...

, Green married Edna Kathleen Hiscock, the 27-year-old daughter of a builder, Herbert Woodbridge Hiscock, and his wife Eleanor. In 1935, they were living at 241, Richmond Road, Twickenham, and the next year at 1,

Walpole Street Walpole Street is a street in Chelsea, London, running north-west to south-east from King's Road to St Leonard's Terrace and Burton's Court. The MacDonald sisters lived at no 33 in the 1850s. In 1936, the Scottish architect G. Kay Green Geor ...

, Chelsea. In September 1936, they announced the birth of a son, Charles. The Post Office Directory for 1938 has Green listed at 8, Orange Street,

Haymarket Haymarket may refer to: Places Australia * Haymarket, New South Wales, area of Sydney, Australia Germany * Heumarkt (KVB), transport interchange in Cologne on the site of the Heumarkt (literally: hay market) Russia * Sennaya Square (''Hay Squ ...

, Westminster W.C.2. In October 1939, the family of three was back in Twickenham, and Green died a few weeks later. When Green's widow died in 1993, her death was registered as Edna Kathleen Green or Kay-Green."Green or Kay-Green, Edna Kathleen, Birth 04/12/1902, Death 04/1993, Northern Surrey" in ''General Index to Register of Deaths for England and Wales'', 1936

References

External links

George Kay Green
at themodernhouse.com {{DEFAULTSORT:Green, George Kay 1877 births 1939 deaths British Army personnel of World War I People educated at George Watson's College Royal Engineers soldiers Royal Army Service Corps officers Scottish architects People from Peacehaven Art Deco architects