Patrick Barry Garnett (11 March 1932 – 4 May 2006) was a Welsh architect, a leading member of his profession in

Swinging Sixties The Swinging Sixties was a youth-driven cultural revolution that took place in the United Kingdom during the mid-to-late 1960s, emphasising modernity and fun-loving hedonism, with Swinging London as its centre. It saw a flourishing in art, mus ...

London.

Early life

Born in Rhyl, Wales, Garnett was the son of a builder. He grew up in an Art Deco house on the sea front and was educated at

Rhyl Grammar School Rhyl High School is one of two high schools in Rhyl, Wales. It was founded in 1894. History Rhyl and District Intermediate School was founded in 1894. In 1901 the school was relocated to Grange Road and became Rhyl County School. The school sub ...

and the University of Manchester, where he met his future business partner Tony Cloughley, also a student of architecture. Jonathan Glancey
"Patrick Garnett, Architect whose designs caught the mood of swinging London"
'' The Guardian'', 8 June 2006, accessed 3 October 2023

Career

After graduating, Garnett worked in the office of Sir Howard Robertson on the design of the Shell Centre in

Lambeth Lambeth () is a district in South London, England, in the London Borough of Lambeth, historically in the County of Surrey. It is situated south of Charing Cross. The population of the London Borough of Lambeth was 303,086 in 2011. The area expe ...

, but did not stay long, setting off to join Frank Lloyd Wright's commune at Taliesin West, in Scottsdale, Arizona. Unfortunately, Wright had died by the time Garnett arrived in the U. S. He settled instead in New York, working for Carson and Lundin, then in Los Angeles, where he was with Welton Becket. Returning to Rhyl, Garnett designed a steel and glass racetrack there. He then moved to London and in 1959 formed a partnership with his old Manchester friend, Tony Cloughley, called Garnett & Cloughley. They soon accepted a third partner, Erik Blakemore (1926-1987), an Elstree Studios film set designer, the firm becoming Garnett Cloughley Blakemore, or GCB. After designing sets for '' Three Crooked Men'' (1958) and ''

The Great Van Robbery ''The Great Van Robbery'' is a low budget 1959 British crime film. Plot Scotland Yard teams up with Interpol to discover the origins of stolen money in a private bank account in Rio de Janeiro. Assigning their best detective Caesar Smith to t ...

'' (1959), Blakemore had moved on to designing the Beachcomber Bar at the May Fair Hotel, and GCB got work for

Billy Butlin Sir William Heygate Edmund Colborne Butlin (29 September 189912 June 1980) was a South African-born British entrepreneur whose name is synonymous with the British holiday camp.''#refRiverside, American Heritage Dictionary 2004'', p. 135.#refSc ...

at his holiday camps at Bognor Regis, Barry Island,

Minehead Minehead is a coastal town and civil parish in Somerset, England. It lies on the south bank of the Bristol Channel, north-west of the county town of Taunton, from the boundary with the county of Devon and in proximity of the Exmoor National P ...

, and Skegness. It also worked for

Lord Forte Charles Carmine Forte, Baron Forte (26 November 1908 – 28 February 2007) was an Italian-born Scottish hotelier who founded the leisure and hotels conglomerate that ultimately became the Forte Group. Early life Charles Forte was born as Car ...

of Trust House Forte, designing complete holiday villages. It did domestic work on expensive flats and many projects for British Airways and the

Spaghetti House ''Spaghetti House'' is a 1982 Italian comedy film directed by Giulio Paradisi. It is loosely based on the Spaghetti House siege that occurred in 1975. Plot In an attempted armed robbery of an Italian restaurant in London, the staff members ar ...

. The GCB style was greatly influenced by the Italian designer Albrizzi, who was fond of stainless steel and glass. At its peak, GCBvemployed a hundred architects and worked around the world as well as in Britain, its projects including holiday villages in Cyprus, airport lounges in Tehran, and interiors at Windsor Castle and the

Palace of Westminster The Palace of Westminster serves as the meeting place for both the House of Commons of the United Kingdom, House of Commons and the House of Lords, the two houses of the Parliament of the United Kingdom. Informally known as the Houses of Parli ...

. Its interior for the Chelsea Drugstore can be seen in the

Stanley Kubrick Stanley Kubrick (; July 26, 1928 – March 7, 1999) was an American film director, producer, screenwriter, and photographer. Widely considered one of the greatest filmmakers of all time, his films, almost all of which are adaptations of nove ...

film '' A Clockwork Orange''. In 1985, Garnett left GCB to launch his own architectural practice, with offices in

Covent Garden Covent Garden is a district in London, on the eastern fringes of the West End, between St Martin's Lane and Drury Lane. It is associated with the former fruit-and-vegetable market in the central square, now a popular shopping and tourist si ...

. His later work included the Trocadero Leisure Centre, Piccadilly Circus, and the refurbishment of the Turkish embassy in Belgrave Square.

Personal life

On his return to Rhyl from the US, Garnett married Derry Needham, whom he had known since childhood, and they had two sons and two daughters. With success, they moved into a Georgian town house in

Royal Avenue, Chelsea Royal Avenue is a garden square in Chelsea, London. The street runs between the King's Road and St Leonard's Terrace. History Royal Avenue was laid out in the 1690s by William III with the intention that it form part of a proposed carriage way ...

, and were known for their fashionable parties."Patrick Garnett, Architect and interior designer"
'' The Independent'', 5 June 2006, accessed 4 October 2023 He died in May 2006.

Notable work by GCB

*The Top of the Tower Restaurant in the Post Office Tower (1966) *Albrizzi furniture showroom, Sloane Square (1968) *Just Looking boutique, King's Road (1968) * Chelsea Drugstore, King's Road (1968) *New apartments in the Queen's Tower at Windsor Castle *Interiors for the

QE2 ''Queen Elizabeth 2'' (''QE2'') is a retired British ocean liner converted into a floating hotel. Originally built for the Cunard Line, the ship, named as the second ship named ''Queen Elizabeth'', was operated by Cunard as both a transatlantic ...

(1967–1969) *House in Belgravia for Earl Mountbatten of Burma *Scratchwood Services (now London Gateway services), M1 motorway(1969) * Corley Services (1972)

Notes

{{DEFAULTSORT:Garnett, Patrick Barry 1932 births 2006 deaths 20th-century Welsh architects Alumni of the Manchester School of Architecture