Alexander Parris: Difference between revisions

|motherparents=Mercy Thompson<br />Matthew Parris

|significant_buildings=[[Virginia Executive Mansion]]<br/>[[Quincy Market]]

Parris was born in [[Halifax, Massachusetts]]. WhenAt agedthe age of 16, he apprenticed to a housewright in [[Pembroke, Massachusetts|Pembroke]], but talent led him towards [[architecture]]. Married to Silvina Bonney Stetson in 1800, he moved to [[Portland, Maine]], which was then experiencing a building boom. The city had been bombarded during the [[American Revolution|Revolution]] by the [[Royal Navy]], reducing three-quarters to ashes in 1775. But following the war, its trade recovered, almost challenging [[Boston, Massachusetts|Boston]] as the busiest port in [[New England]]. Parris received numerous residential and commercial commissions, working in the fashionable style of architect [[Charles Bulfinch]]. Like most housewrights of the era, he often used elements derived directly from [[English people|English]] architectural books, or those published in the United States by [[Asher Benjamin]]. Unfortunately, some of his designs were lost in the [[1866 Great Fire of Portland, Maine|Great Fire of 1866]], but early photographs and Parris' surviving drawings bespeak works of [[Neoclassical architecture|neoclassical]] artistry and taste.

[[Image:The Governor's Mansion, Richmond, VA.jpg|thumb|right|The [[Executive Mansion (Virginia)|Executive Mansion]] at Richmond, Virginia in, c. 1905]]

The boom would end, however, with [[Thomas Jefferson|Jefferson's]] [[Embargo Act of 1807|Embargo of 1807]], which lasted 14 months and devastated Portland's mercantile base. Merchants went bankrupt. The Portland Bank, its building designed by Parris, failed. By 1809, construction in the city had come to a halt. Parris left for [[Richmond, Virginia]], where he designed the [[Wickham House]] and the [[Executive Mansion (Virginia)|Executive Mansion]]. But architect [[Benjamin Latrobe]] examined Parris' preliminary plans for the Wickham House, which resembled his previous Federal style works in Portland, and gave it a blistering review. Latrobe's advice left a profound imprint on the future work of Parris, beginning with the building's revised design. Consequently, the Wickham House is considered a watershed design by Parris, marking the shift from his earlier [[Adamesque]] period towards his later, more severe, monumental and [[wikt:architectonic|architectonic]] period. In the [[War of 1812]], he served in [[Plattsburgh (city), New York|PlattsburgPlattsburgh, New York]] as a Captain of the Artificers (engineers), gaining knowledge of military requirements for engineering.

In 1815, he moved to Boston, where he found a position in the office of Charles Bulfinch. Like his famous employer, Parris produced refined residences, churches and commercial buildings. When in 1817 Bulfinch was called to [[Washington, D.C.|Washington]] to work on the [[U.S. Capitol Building]], Parris helped complete the Bulfinch Building home of the [[Ether Dome]] at [[Massachusetts General Hospital]]. With Bulfinch's departure, Parris soon became the city's leading architect, and a proponent of what would be called "Boston [[Granite]] Style,", with austere, monolithic stonework. Around 1818-1823 he kept an office on [[Court Street (Boston, Massachusetts)|Court Street]].<ref>Boston Directory. 1818, 1823</ref> He belonged to the [[Massachusetts Charitable Mechanic Association]].<ref>Joseph Jenkins. An address delivered before the Massachusetts Charitable Mechanick Association, December 17, 1818, being the anniversary of the choice of officers, and fourth triennial celebration of their public festival. (Boston: Munroe & Francis, 1819)</ref>

Parris balanced the delicacy of his "superb draftsmanship,", as it was called, with the coarseness of his building material of choice: granite. His most famous building, [[Quincy Market]], is made of it. Parris died in Pembroke, where he is interred in the Briggs Burying Ground.

* 1801 - [[Joseph Holt Ingraham]] House]], Portland, Maine

* 1807 - [[St. John's Church (Portsmouth, New Hampshire)|St. John's Church]], [[Portsmouth, New Hampshire]]

* Richard M. Candee, "Maine Towns, Maine People -- Architecture and the Community, 1783-1820,", a chapter in ''Maine in the Early Republic''; Maine Historical Society & [[Maine Humanities Council]]; University Press of New England, Hanover & London 1988

* Arthur Gerrier, "Alexander Parris' Portland Years, 1801-1809,", ''Landmarks Observer'' (Greater Portland Landmarks, Inc.), VIII, November–December 1981, pp.&nbsp;10–11

* Edward F. Zimmer, Pamela J. Scott, "Alexander Parris, B. Henry Latrobe and the John Wickham House in Richmond, Virginia,", ''The Journal of the Society of Architectural Historians'', Vol. 41, No. 3 (October, 1982), pp.&nbsp;202–211

* [https://web.archive.org/web/20050825133150/http://www.parrisproject.org/Default.htm Alexander Parris Digital Project]

* [https://web.archive.org/web/20080821103115/http://www.mosespaysonmansion.org/ Moses Payson House (1809-1810)]

* [https://web.archive.org/web/20070711215509/http://www.richmondhistorycenter.com/wickham.asp Wickham House -- The Valentine Richmond History Center]

[[Category:PeopleArchitects from Boston, Massachusetts]]

[[Category:19th century in Boston, Massachusetts]]

[[Category:NRHPArchitects architectsfrom Portland, Maine]]

[[Category:ArchitectsEngineers from Maine]]

[[Category:ArchitectsEngineers from Massachusetts]]