Silvanus Trevail was born in Luxulyan, Cornwall, in October 1851 and was educated first at the village school and then at Ledrah House School, St Austell before being sent to work in London in the offices of Henry Garling FRIBA. He returned to Cornwall in 1872 and was commissioned to design the Elementary Board School, Mount Charles, St Austell, the first of 35 new schools he designed in Cornwall as a result of the surge in school building following the passing of the Education Act.
In 1878 his designs were exhibited at the Exhibition of of British Architecture at the Paris Exposition and at exhibitions in Sydney, where he received a medal and diploma for his design of Fowey Grammar School, and Melbourne.
In 1893 he was commissioned to design the Hayle Institute, for Passmore Edwards, and over the next 7 years designed many, but not all, of the Passmore Edwards buildings in Cornwall as well as the East Ham Hospital and the Plashet Public Library, East Ham,London. Other buildings he designed included a number of chapels and churches in Cornwall, several of Cornwall’s most well known hotels and mansion houses at Blisland and St Ives, Cornwall, and in Dublin. The latter is now the Department of Pharmacy building for Dublin University.
In Cornwall he was well respected as a Borough Councillor, and later Mayor, in Truro and as a County Councilor, whilst his professional reputation was acknowledged by election as Fellow of the RIBA and firstly Vice President of the Society of Architects in 1896 and then President in 1901-1903.
The Silvanus Trevail Society was formed to encourage interest in the work of Silvanus Trevail, a gifted architect, an effective local politician and, above all, a great Cornishman.
Silvanus Trevail
Posted in Architects.