Nicholas Hawksmoor

Nicholas Hawksmoor was an English architect. He was a leading figure of the English Baroque style of architecture in the lateseventeenth and earlyeighteenth centuries. Hawksmoor worked alongside the principal architects of the time, Christopher Wren and John Vanbrugh, and contributed to the design of some of the most notable buildings of the period, including St Pauls Cathedral, Wrens City of London churches, Blenheim Palace and Castle Howard. Part of his work has been correctly attributed to him only relatively recently, and his influence has reached several poets and authors of the twentieth century.

Hawksmoor was born in Nottinghamshire in 1661, into a yeoman farming family, almost certainly in East Drayton or Ragnall, Nottinghamshire. On his death he was to leave property at nearby Ragnall, Dunham and a house and land at Great Drayton. It is not known where he received his schooling, but it was probably in more than basic literacy. George Vertue, whose family had property in Hawksmoors part of Nottinghamshire, wrote in 1731 that he was taken as a youth to act as clerk by Justice Mellust in Yorkshire, where Mr Gouge senior did some fretwork ceilings afterwards Mr. Haukesmore came to London, became clerk to Sr. Christopher Wren amp thence became an Architect.

Source: Wikipedia