William Turnbull (1868 – 22 June 1941) was an architect based in

Wellington Wellington ( mi, Te Whanganui-a-Tara or ) is the capital city of New Zealand. It is located at the south-western tip of the North Island, between Cook Strait and the Remutaka Range. Wellington is the second-largest city in New Zealand by me ...

, New Zealand. He was the fourth and youngest son of architect

Thomas Turnbull Thomas Turnbull (1824–1907) was a notable New Zealand architect. He was born in Glasgow, Lanarkshire, Scotland in 1824. After qualifying as an architect, Turnbull moved to Melbourne, Australia in 1851. Then in 1861 he moved to San Fran ...

. He joined his father's practice in 1882 and became a partner in 1891. He was born in

San Francisco San Francisco (; Spanish language, Spanish for "Francis of Assisi, Saint Francis"), officially the City and County of San Francisco, is the commercial, financial, and cultural center of Northern California. The city proper is the List of Ca ...

where his father was working at the time. He moved to New Zealand with his family in 1871. In his younger years, he played

rugby union Rugby union, commonly known simply as rugby, is a close-contact team sport that originated at Rugby School in the first half of the 19th century. One of the two codes of rugby football, it is based on running with the ball in hand. In its m ...

at Poneke Football Club in

Kilbirnie Kilbirnie ( Gaelic: ''Cill Bhraonaigh'') is a small town of 7,280 (as of 2001) inhabitants situated in the Garnock Valley area of North Ayrshire, on the west coast of Scotland. It is around southwest of Glasgow and approximately from Paisle ...

. Turnbull designed a large house including three rooms to hold a library for bibliophile Alexander Turnbull (no relation) in 1914. The outbreak of World War I caused the construction to be delayed until late 1915, with Alexander Turnbull moving in the following year. Turnbull House was used as a library until 1973, and the collection formed the nucleus of the national library collection. Turnbull House is listed by

Heritage New Zealand Heritage New Zealand Pouhere Taonga (initially the National Historic Places Trust and then, from 1963 to 2014, the New Zealand Historic Places Trust) ( mi, Pouhere Taonga) is a Crown entity with a membership of around 20,000 people that advocate ...

as a Category I heritage building. Turnbull moved to his son's house in

Willis Street Willis Street is a prominent street in the central business district of Wellington, the capital city of New Zealand. Along with Courtenay Place, Manners Street and Lambton Quay, the lower reaches of Willis Street form part of the "Golden Mile" ...

when he was old, and he died there on 22 June 1941, aged 73. He was buried at

Karori Cemetery Karori Cemetery is New Zealand's second largest cemetery, located in the Wellington suburb of Karori. History Karori Cemetery opened in 1891 to address overcrowding at Bolton Street Cemetery. In 1909, it received New Zealand's first cremato ...

. His wife had died 18 months before him. He was survived by four sons and four daughters.

Gallery of his work

Image:AntrimHouse.jpg, Image:House (Dr Henry Pollen's), Wellington, New Zealand (15).JPG, Image:Whitcoulls Building, Wellington, New Zealand (44).JPG, Image:New Zealand Stock Exchange and St John's Buildings, Wellington.jpg, Image:Bank_of_New_Zealand,_Cuba_St,_Wellington.jpg, Image:The_Manor_in_Wellington.jpg, Image:Turnbull_House_-_Wellington.jpg,

References

1868 births 1941 deaths 19th-century New Zealand architects People from Wellington City 20th-century New Zealand architects Burials at Karori Cemetery {{NewZealand-architect-stub