Robin Dods

Its influence was felt there right up until the beginning of World War I. Robin Dods was a gifted and capable designer, and was well connected.

His surgeon stepfather, Dr Charles Ferdinand Marks, and his uncle, James Stodart, were both members of the Queensland Parliament, in its Upper and Lower houses respectively.

Hall & Dods were architects in Queensland for several national enterprises including the AMP Society, the Bank of New South Wales, the New Zealand Insurance Co, JC Hutton & Co, the Australian Mercantile Land and Finance Company, the Engineering Supply Company of Australia as well as several local department stores.

It was in Naples that he met Charles Rennie Mackintosh, who was also travelling to fulfil the terms of the Alexander Thomson Scholarship which he had won the previous year.

Macintosh was destined to be recognised as one of the pioneers of the Modern Movement, and this meeting could have influenced Dods' architectural outlook.

At the age of 52, a busy and useful life was thus cut short, and a distinguished architect passed on, to leave in Queensland a legacy of outstanding achievement in the development of its architecture.

He built for himself a house at Edgecliff, described by a contemporary as "charming in its quiet Georgian character, well planned, and forming an attractive setting for the antique furniture he had collected for many years."

The Newcastle Club, from the offices of Spain and Cosh, is certainly Dods' work, as it exhibits many features characteristic of his Queensland domestic architecture.

His clients were evidently people with means, since a great bulk of his Brisbane houses were in the wealthy suburbs of Clayfield and New Farm.

His belief that an insulating layer of air over the house was essential gave rise to the characteristic high-pitched roof ventilated by gablets and neat lanterns.

[4] The Robin Dods Award for Residential Architecture – Houses (New) was established in his honour by the Queensland chapter of the Australian Institute of Architects.

By and large, Dods' commercial work was not inspiring, but several of his buildings were significant, advanced for their time, and well worthy of further study.