Hawksmoor worked alongside the principal architects of the time, Christopher Wren and John Vanbrugh, and contributed to the design of some of the most notable buildings of the period, including St Paul's Cathedral, Wren's City of London churches, Greenwich Hospital, Blenheim Palace and Castle Howard.

A surviving early sketch-book contains sketches and notes, some dated 1680 and 1683, of buildings in Nottingham, Coventry, Warwick, Bath, Bristol, Oxford and Northampton.

"[3] Only in 1726 after Benson's successor Thomas Hewet died, was Hawksmoor restored to the secretaryship, though not the clerkship which was given to Henry Flitcroft.

In 1696, Hawksmoor was appointed surveyor to the Westminster and Middlesex Commission of Sewers, but was dismissed in 1700, having neglected to attend the Court several days last past.

[citation needed] In 1702, Hawksmoor designed the baroque country house of Easton Neston in Northamptonshire for Sir William Fermor.

He then worked for a time with Sir John Vanbrugh, assisting him on the building Blenheim Palace for John Churchill, 1st Duke of Marlborough, where he took charge from 1705, after Vanbrugh's final break with the demanding Sarah Churchill, Duchess of Marlborough, and Castle Howard for Charles Howard, later the 3rd Earl of Carlisle.

[6] In 1711, parliament passed an Act for the building of Fifty New Churches in the Cities of London and Westminster or the Suburbs thereof,[7] which established a commission which included Christopher Wren, John Vanbrugh, Thomas Archer and a number of churchmen.

His will instructed that he be buried at the church of St Botolph Shenley, Hertfordshire, Shenleybury, which has been deconsecrated so the tomb now sits in a private garden.

obijt vicesimo quin[t]o die [Martii] Anno Domini 1736 Aetatis 75Hawksmoor's only child was a daughter, Elizabeth, whose second husband, Nathanial Blackerby, wrote the obituary of his father-in-law.

27 March 1736: Thursday morning died, at this house on Mill-Bank, Westminster, in a very advanced age, the learned and ingenious Nicholas Hawksmoor, Esq, one of the greatest Architects this or the preceding Century has produc'd.

In King Charles II's reign, he was employ'd under Sir Christopher Wren, in the stately buildings at Winchester; as he was likewise in all the other publick structures, Palaces &c, erected by that great Man, under whom he was assisting, from the Beginning [factually wrong, Hawksmoor was 14 years old then] to the Finishing of that grand and noble Edifice the cathedral of St. Paul's, and of all the churches rebuilt after the Fire of London.

In the Reigns of King William and Queen Anne, he was Clerk of their Majesties Works at Kensington, and at Whitehall, St. Jame's and Westminster.

He was chiefly concern'd in designing and building a great number of magnificent Nobleman's Houses, and particularly (with Sir John Vanbrugh) those of Blenheim and Castle-Howard, at the latter of which he was at his Death, carrying on a Mausoleum in the most elegant and grand Stile, not to mention many others: But one of the most surprising of his undertakings, was the repairing of Beverley Minster, where the stone wall on the north-side was near three Foot out of the perpendicular, which he mov'd at once to its upright by means of a machine of his own invention.

He was perfectly skill'd in the History of Architecture, and could give exact account of all the famous buildings, both Antient and Modern, in every part of the world; to which his excellent memory, that never fail'd him to the very last, greatly contributed.

In his private life he was a tender husband, a loving father, a sincere friend, and a most agreeable companion; nor could the most poignant pains of Gout, which he for many years laboured under, ever ruffle or discompose his evenness of temper.

And as his memory must always be dear to his Country, so the loss of so great and valuable man in sensibly, and in a more particular manner felt by those who had the pleasure of his personal acquaintance, and enjoy'd the happiness of his conversation.Upon his death he left a widow, to whom he bequeathed all his property in Westminster, Highgate, Shenley, and East Drayton, who later married William Theaker; the grandchild of this second marriage ultimately inherited Hawksmoor's properties near Drayton after the death of the architect's widow.

Algernon Stitch lived in a "superb creation by Nicholas Hawksmoor" in London in the novel Scoop by Evelyn Waugh (1938).

Both Sinclair and Ackroyd's ideas in turn were further developed by Alan Moore and Eddie Campbell in their graphic novel, From Hell, which speculated that Jack the Ripper used Hawksmoor's buildings as part of ritual magic, with his victims as human sacrifice.

In the appendix, Moore revealed that he had met and spoken with Sinclair on numerous occasions while developing the core ideas of the book.