Temple Moore

Temple Lushington Moore
Born	(1856-06-07)7 June 1856 Tullamore, Ireland
Died	Hampstead, London
Nationality	English
Occupation	Architect
Buildings	St Wilfrid's Church, Harrogate All Saints Church, Stroud

Temple Lushington Moore (7 June 1856 – 30 June 1920) was an English architect who practised in London. He designed almost entirely in the Gothic Revival tradition, and his major works were related to churches – new churches, restorations, additions and alterations, and fittings and furniture. He did some work on domestic properties, and also designed memorial crosses.

Life and career

File:TempleLushingtonMooreTombstone.jpg

Moore's tombstone, also commemorating his son Richard Moore, lost in 1918 in the sinking of the RMS Leinster.

Temple Moore was born in Tullamore, County Offaly, Ireland, and was the son of an army officer. He was educated at Glasgow High School, then from 1872 privately by Revd Richard Wilton in Londesborough in the East Riding of Yorkshire. In 1875 he moved to London and was articled to architect George Gilbert Scott, Jr.. During his training he travelled in France, Germany and Belgium. Although Moore set up his own practice in 1878, he continued to work closely with Scott, helping to complete his works when Scott's health deteriorated. In 1884 he married Emma Storrs Wilton, the eldest daughter of Revd Wilton. Moore's pupils in his practice included Giles Gilbert Scott, son of George. In 1905 he was elected a Fellow of the Royal Institute of British Architects. Moore's only son, Richard, was articled to his father and it was expected that he would continue the practice. However he pre-deceased his father, being killed in 1918 when RMS Leinster was torpedoed and sunk. Temple Moore's son-in-law, Leslie Thomas Moore, joined the practice during the following year. Temple Moore died at his home in Hampstead in 1920, and was buried at St John's Church, Hampstead. His estate amounted to a little over £5,635 (£ as of 2025). Leslie Moore continued the practice, completing some of Temple Moore's commissions.

Works

File:St Marks Mansfield June 2009 02.JPG

St. Mark's Church, Mansfield, listed at Grade II*

File:High Altar, Chesterfield Parish Church.JPG

The high altar in the Church of St Mary and All Saints, Chesterfield showing the reredos designed by Temple Moore

Moore's main contributions to architecture were his churches; he designed about 40 new churches, and the cathedral in Nairobi. He also restored older churches, and made alterations and additions to others. In addition he designed fittings and items of furniture for the interiors of churches. In other fields, he designed and altered country houses, and other buildings including schools, vicarages, parish halls, a court house, and memorial and churchyard crosses.

In 1908, Moore made the organ case, choir stalls, reredos and communion rail for St Michael and All Angels Church, Badminton.

Moore's career spanned the closing years of the Gothic Revival, but he developed the style rather than merely continuing it. In his entry in the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography the author states that his "artistic destiny was not to preserve an attenuating tradition but to bring to maturity a development which otherwise would have remained incomplete", and also expresses the opinion that he was "England's leading ecclesiastical architect from the mid-Edwardian years". Of his work, the architectural historian Nikolaus Pevsner said that he "is always sensitive in his designs and often interesting". Moore was an Anglican in the Anglo-Catholic tradition, which prefers its churches to have beautiful surroundings and fine fittings to enhance worship; Moore's designs reflect this.

The National Heritage List for England shows that at least 34 of Moore's new churches are designated as listed buildings. Two of these, St Wilfrid, Harrogate, and All Saints, Stroud, are listed at Grade I, and at least 16 of the others are at Grade II*. For his secular works, Moore received praise from his contemporaries for remodelling South Hill Park in Berkshire, and for restoring the Treasurer's House and St William's College in York.

See also

• List of new churches by Temple Moore
• List of church restorations and alterations by Temple Moore
• List of church fittings and furniture by Temple Moore
• List of miscellaneous works by Temple Moore