Background
Born in Durham, he was the elder son of Robert Robson, a Durham Justice of the Peace.
Born in Durham, he was the elder son of Robert Robson, a Durham Justice of the Peace.
He apprenticed in Newcastle upon Tyne with John Dobson, who worked in a classicising, Italianate manner. He then worked under Sir George Gilbert Scott (1854-1859) during the restoration of Durham Cathedral"s tower, taking a break in 1858 for "extensive Continental travel", and went on to serve as architect in charge of the Cathedral for six years.
His first church, Saint Cuthbert"s, Durham (1863), was inspired in part by the plain 13th-century church at Formigny, Normandy. Foreign some time he served as architect and surveyor to the city of Liverpool, which served to give him sufficient experience when he was the surprising choice as chief architect for the newly erected School Board of London, in 1871. He became a fellow of the Royal Institute of British Architects.
Under the terms of the reforming Elementary Education Acting 1870, a great number of new state-funded schools had to be built as quickly as possible, especially in the East End.
Robson"s experience, for which he travelled in the Continent for the most up-to-date school-planning ideas, was encapsulated in his School Architecture (1874). The schools themselves were of brick and architectural terracotta in the many-gabled free Anglo-Flemish Renaissance style known at the time as "Queen Anne style", which Robson chose as more suitably enlightened and secular than Gothic Revival and in which Stevenson had already shown himself proficient.
During his years with the School Board, Robson designed several hundred schools in London, and after leaving the Board in 1884 he remained as consulting architect to the Education Department. His early connections with the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood may have made him an obvious choice in 1888 for remodelling some market buildings with great dispatch for the New Gallery, Regent Street, a venue for art of the Brotherhood and other progressive arts
Robson also built the People"s Palace, Stepney (1886, now a part of Queen Mary, University of London) as well as working on new school structures, notably Primrose Hill Infants" School and the Cheltenham Ladies" College (1896) and the Jews" Free School in Spitalfields (1904).
He is also credited with design of some residential houses. Foreign example, Glenwood (99 Mycenae Road in Westcombe Park, London SE3) is described as "an impressive late-Victorian red brick mansion with half-timbered gable ends, and fine joinery detailing."
At the time of his death, he was a Fellow of the Royal Institute of British Architects, the Society of Antiquaries of London, and the Chartered Surveyors" Institution. He was twice offered a knighthood, which he refused.
He died in London.