Norman Eaton

Norman Musgrave Eaton (11 October 1902 – 19 July 1966) was a South African architect, known for his design of bank buildings, schools and houses. He was heavily influenced by Frank Lloyd Wright but moved away from the lack of identity of the International Style and instigated the Regionalist approach to modern architecture in South Africa, now known as 'Pretoria Regionalism'. . The artist Alexis Preller noted that Eaton's design bywords were "simple, delicate, sensitive, individual", and that "his outstanding use of simple brick is legendary".

Eaton was sent to boarding school at an early age; first at Pretoria and then, from 1915 to 1921, at the Diocesan College in Cape Town. In 1922, he began studying at the University of the Witwatersrand in Johannesburg where, in his first year, he won a student competition for the design of a Byzantine chapel. This caught the attention of the architect Gordon Leith, who offered him an apprenticeship, and training in the strict classical tradition. Eaton worked for Leith during the day and attended classes at night and, when Leith won the contract to build the Pretoria Technical College in 1926, he put Eaton in charge. In 1929, Eaton won the Baker Travelling Scholarship and graduated with a Diploma in Architecture in 1930. Sir Herbert Baker also signed Eaton's nomination papers for membership in the Royal Institute of British Architects. Eaton spent nine months at the British School at Rome, then toured Europe and, after a long stay in Britain, returned to South Africa in 1933. He settled in Pretoria and established his own firm.

Career Eaton specialized in sleek, unpainted brick houses with African elements, including motifs reminiscent of Great Zimbabwe. Later designs also incorporated aspects of ancient Egyptian architecture. He also designed furniture, shops, office interiors, light industrial buildings, pools and fountains, brasswork, and memorial stones. If he thought a garden needed pottery, he designed the pottery. His houses emphasized Regionalism through the use of local material and forms, including patterned brickwork, serpentine walls, small windows, awnings, and eaves, traditional wooden shutters, enclosed gardens, and large patches of earth-tone paved stone.

In 1940, he earned his first major commercial commission, the Land Bank Building in Potchefstroom. That year, he entered a five-year partnership with another architect, Alan Fair. From 1945 to 1952, Norman Eaton & Partners included Fair, Robert Cole Bowen, Adriaan Louw Meiring and D.F.H. Naudé. In 1945, he traveled to the United States, Argentina and Brazil, as well as parts of southern and central Africa. Upon his return, because of his appreciation of Cape Dutch architecture as a true vernacular, he was invited to restore the Reinet House in Graaff-Reinet. He owned a significant collection of paintings by contemporary South African artists and was a member of the South African Society of Artists, as well as the Pretoria Music Society, the Simon van der Stel Foundation (now Heritage South Africa), the Pretoria Country Club and the Old Pretoria Society.

Eaton died in a car crash in 1966. At his memorial service, tributes from artists and architects accompanied a slide-show of his works with a commentary about his interest in music, history and art. The proceeding was published by the South African Architectural Record.

Recognition and awards Eaton was a member of the South African Institute of Architects, the Royal Institute of British Architects, and the Suid-Afrikaanse Akademie vir Wetenskap en Kuns, receiving its Gold Medal Award for services to Architecture in South Africa from 1957 to 1960. In 1968, the South African Institute of Architects posthumously awarded him its Gold Medal. Norman Eaton: Architect - A Study of the Work of the South African Architect Norman Eaton 1902-1966, Clinton Harrop-Allin, 1975. ISBN 9780869770535 The Norman Eaton Legacy: A Critical Architectural Appraisal of the Documentation of His Domestic Oeuvre, Marguerite Pienaar, 2013

The University of Pretoria has made Eaton's oeuvre, in its entirety, and including plans and drawings for completed projects, proposals and ideas, available for download, free of charge.

Works

Boyes House, Pretoria, 1933 Smook Cottage, Pretoria, 1933 Barclays Bank, East End, Pretoria, 1933, Renovation Moggeridge House, Pretoria, 1933 Price House: The Laurels, Pretoria, 1934 Viljoen House, Pretoria, 1935 Frommurze House, Brooklyn, Pretoria, 1935 Gascoyne House, Pretoria, 1935 Nicholson House, Pretoria, 1935 Rademeyer House, Pretoria, 1936 Kuisis Flats, block, Pretoria, 1935 Rademeyer House, Pretoria, 1936 Theron House, Brooklyn, Pretoria, 1936 Patridge Bungalow, Pretoria, 1936 100-Bath Block, Warmbaths, 1937 de Loor House, Pretoria, 1937 van Wouw House, Pretoria, 1937 SABC Studio, Pretoria, 1937 Pretoria High School for Girls, Swimming Pools, 1938 Pretoria Country Club, c 1938 Bram Fischer House, Johannesburg, 1938 Webbs Motor Tyre Works, Pretoria, 1939 Lodder House, Brooklyn, Pretoria, 1939 Children's Art Centre, Pretoria, 1940 Teichman Cottage, Pretoria, 1940 Land Bank Building, Potchefstroom, 1940 Land Bank Building, Ermelo, 1940 Eybers House, Pretoria, 1941 van der Merwe House, Pretoria, 1941 Jacobsz Cottage, Pretoria, 1943 Land Bank Building, Pietermaritzburg, 1943 Land Bank Building, Kroonstad, 1944 Meerhof Hospital for Sick Children (Meerhof School), 1944 O'C Mags House, Naboomspruit, 1946 Pretoria North High School, 1946 Brakpan Educational Centre, Brakpan, 1946 Timaloo Farm Homestead, Potgietersrust, 1948 K.F.R Hubsch Shop, Pretoria, 1950 Greenwood House, Pretoria, 1950 Borckenhagen House, Pretoria, 1935 and 1951 Anderson House, Pretoria, 1951 De Nederlandsche Bank Building (Nedbank), Pretoria, 1953 du Preez House, Johannesburg, 1954 Reinet House, Graaff-Reinet, 1956, Restoration Holsboer House, Pretoria, 1956 Heystek House, Pretoria, 1957 Boorsma House, Potchefstroom, 1958 Wachthuis (Polley's Arcade), Pretoria, 1959 Bosch House, White River, Mpumalanga, 1960 Preller House: 'Dombeya', Hartbeespoort, 1960 De Nederlandsche Bank Building (Nedbank), Durban, 1961 Little Theatre Unisa, Pretoria, 1961 Courtyard House, Pretoria, 1961 van Wyk House, Riversdale, 1962. Renovation. Sanlam Building, Krugersdorp, c 1962 St Paul's Anglican Church, Johannesburg, 1963 Van den Berg House, Pretoria, 1964