Sir George Grenfell-Baines (born George Baines; 30 April 1908 – 9 May 2003) was an

English English usually refers to: * English language * English people English may also refer to: Peoples, culture, and language * ''English'', an adjective for something of, from, or related to England ** English national ...

architect An architect is a person who plans, designs and oversees the construction of buildings. To practice architecture means to provide services in connection with the design of buildings and the space within the site surrounding the buildings that h ...

and town planner. Born in

Preston Preston is a place name, surname and given name that may refer to: Places England *Preston, Lancashire, an urban settlement **The City of Preston, Lancashire, a borough and non-metropolitan district which contains the settlement **County Boro ...

, his family's humble circumstances forced him to start work at the age of fourteen. Both George and his younger brother, Richard (Dick), were prodigiously gifted

mathematician A mathematician is someone who uses an extensive knowledge of mathematics in their work, typically to solve mathematical problems. Mathematicians are concerned with numbers, data, quantity, structure, space, models, and change. History On ...

s and

draughtsmen A drafter (also draughtsman / draughtswoman in British and Commonwealth English, draftsman / draftswoman or drafting technician in American and Canadian English) is an engineering technician who makes detailed technical drawings or plans for ...

. Grenfell-Baines left a secure, but limiting, job in the

Lancashire Lancashire ( , ; abbreviated Lancs) is the name of a historic county, ceremonial county, and non-metropolitan county in North West England. The boundaries of these three areas differ significantly. The non-metropolitan county of Lancas ...

County Architect's Office to work for the prestigious private firm of Bradshaw Gass & Hope in

Bolton Bolton (, locally ) is a large town in Greater Manchester in North West England, formerly a part of Lancashire. A former mill town, Bolton has been a production centre for textiles since Flemish weavers settled in the area in the 14th ...

in 1930. During the 1930s, Grenfell-Baines became aware of

Modernism Modernism is both a philosophical and arts movement that arose from broad transformations in Western society during the late 19th and early 20th centuries. The movement reflected a desire for the creation of new forms of art, philosophy, an ...

, particularly the work of

Le Corbusier Charles-Édouard Jeanneret (6 October 188727 August 1965), known as Le Corbusier ( , , ), was a Swiss-French architect, designer, painter, urban planner, writer, and one of the pioneers of what is now regarded as modern architecture. He was ...

and Gropius, through the architectural press and was determined to practise it himself. He studied at Manchester University for two years from 1934. It was at this time he adopted the name George Grenfell Baines at the suggestion of fellow student Gerald Hayforthwaite. Later this was hyphenated as Grenfell-Baines: Grenfell being his mother's maiden name. He was known to friends and colleagues as "GG". In 1935, he was awarded the Heywood prize for the design of

reinforced concrete Reinforced concrete (RC), also called reinforced cement concrete (RCC) and ferroconcrete, is a composite material in which concrete's relatively low ultimate tensile strength, tensile strength and ductility are compensated for by the inclusion ...

flats. The following year he was awarded the third prize in a competition for a new

Rhodesia Rhodesia (, ), officially from 1970 the Republic of Rhodesia, was an unrecognised state in Southern Africa from 1965 to 1979, equivalent in territory to modern Zimbabwe. Rhodesia was the ''de facto'' successor state to the British colony of So ...

n Parliament; the prize money, £250, was enough to enable him to start his own practice.
Grenfell-Baines's work for the

Air Ministry The Air Ministry was a department of the Government of the United Kingdom with the responsibility of managing the affairs of the Royal Air Force, that existed from 1918 to 1964. It was under the political authority of the Secretary of Stat ...

during

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the World War II by country, vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great power ...

brought him to the attention of Anthony Chitty and the

London London is the capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a population of just under 9 million. It stands on the River Thames in south-east England at the head of a estuary dow ...

Modernists. Although Grenfell-Baines always chose to be based in Preston, he cultivated friendships in national and international circles. In 1951, he was invited to design a pavilion for the

Festival of Britain The Festival of Britain was a national exhibition and fair that reached millions of visitors throughout the United Kingdom in the summer of 1951. Historian Kenneth O. Morgan says the Festival was a "triumphant success" during which people: ...

. Grenfell-Baines's post-war work included the

New Towns A planned community, planned city, planned town, or planned settlement is any community that was carefully planned from its inception and is typically constructed on previously undeveloped land. This contrasts with settlements that evolve ...

Newton Aycliffe Newton Aycliffe is a town in County Durham, England. Founded in 1947 under the New Towns Act of 1946, the town sits about five miles to the north of Darlington and ten miles to the south of Durham. It is the oldest new town in the north of Eng ...

(planned 1947) and

Peterlee Peterlee is a town in County Durham, England. It lies between Sunderland to the north, Hartlepool to the south, the Durham Coast to the east and Durham to the west. It gained town status in 1948 under the New Towns Act 1946. The act also cre ...

(planned 1948). An abiding interest for GG was multidisciplinary working. His highly successful firm BDP (Building Design Partnership) was the result of numerous experiments in management structure. In 1972, he became professor of Architecture at

Sheffield University , mottoeng = To discover the causes of things , established = – University of SheffieldPredecessor institutions: – Sheffield Medical School – Firth College – Sheffield Technical School – University College of Sheffield , type = Pu ...

where he founded the Design Teaching Partnership. He officially retired in 1974 but continued working as a consultant into his final decade. He received an OBE in 1960 and was

knighted A knight is a person granted an honorary title of knighthood by a head of state (including the Pope) or representative for service to the monarch, the church or the country, especially in a military capacity. Knighthood finds origins in the G ...

in 1978. Grenfell-Baines was survived by his second wife, Milena Fleischmann, whom he married in 1954, their son and daughter, and the two daughters of his first marriage, to Dorothy Hodson. Milena was a Czech refugee of the Kindertransport.

National Life Stories National Life Stories is an independent charitable trust and limited company (registered as the ‘National Life Story Collection’) based within the British Library Oral History section, whose key focus and expertise is oral history fieldwork. S ...

conducted an oral history interview (C467/46) with George Grenfell-Baines in 2000 for its Architects Lives' collection held by the British Library.National Life Stories, 'Grenfell-Baines, George (1 of 22) National Life Stories Collection: Architects' Lives', The British Library Board, 2000
Retrieved 10 April 2018

References

*Grenfell-Baines, George (2000), interviewed by Louise Brodie at Preston, (5–11 January) *''Architects’ Lives'', London: National Biographical Archive, C467/46/F7839. *White, Bill (1987), ''The Spirit Of BDP'', Preston: BDP.

External links

BDP web site
{{DEFAULTSORT:Grenfell-Baines, George 1908 births 2003 deaths 20th-century English architects Academics of the University of Sheffield Architects from Preston, Lancashire English socialists Knights Bachelor Modernist architects from England Officers of the Order of the British Empire