Building British identity : British architects and the Tudor-Revival country house in Ulster, 1825-50

Abstract

This thesis is an examination of the eight Tudor-Revival country houses designed by the British architects Thomas Rickman, Edward Blore, William Walker and George Sudden in the province of Ulster between 1825 and 1850. It provides the first comprehensive record and contextual analysis of the design and construction of these houses, while also interpreting them as expressions of cultural identity. The relationship between the houses under study and comparable architectural models in Britain is the central theme of this thesis. It investigates the ways in which the form and function of these buildings was shaped by British architectural practice, and by the common identity of the closely-connected Ulster patrons who commissioned them. The principal argument developed in this thesis is that these houses communicate the acute British, Unionist and Protestant sympathies of their owners through their form, function and authorship.