[3] Watkin's main research interest was neoclassical architecture, particularly from the 18th century to the present day, and he published widely on that topic.
He was vice-chairman of the Georgian Group, and was a member of the Historic Buildings Council and its successor bodies in English Heritage from 1980 to 1995.
From 1970 to 2008, he was a fellow of Peterhouse, Cambridge, where he belonged to a circle of right-wing intellectuals centred on the historian Maurice Cowling.
[8] Relying on The Poverty of Historicism by Karl Popper, Watkin argued that use of the Zeitgeist concept in architectural history was fallacious.
[4] Among the contemporary architects Watkin championed were John Simpson and Quinlan Terry, as well as theorist Léon Krier.