Vale Russell C. Jack 1925–2025

Russell Callam Jack commenced his architectural research on the Sydney Technical School (STC) in 1946, following a number of years within the RAAF. A gifted scholar, he gained the Byera Hadley Travelling Scholarship on commencement, travelling in Europe and dealing in London earlier than returning to Australia on the finish of 1953.

In Sydney, he labored for Rudder Littlemore and Rudder for 2 years earlier than going into follow with John Allen (1926–2022), an STC classmate who additionally had labored at Rudder Littlemore and Rudder.

In 1957, the Jack Home in Wahroonga, New South Wales, which Russell and his architect spouse Pamela Jack had designed for themselves, was awarded the distinguished Sulman Medal, and this introduced Russell large acclaim. Set on a steeply sloping block and straddling a rocky creek, this home, with its oiled timber framing and bagged brickwork in and out, was the primary of many Jack homes that have been the forerunners of what turned often known as the Sydney College of structure.

These homes persistently used an identical logical expression of construction and element however differed of their response to particular person website facet and prospect. Additionally they continued Russell’s exploration of the position of a protecting masonry wall delineating the boundary between private and non-private area.

Whereas typically included as a member of the Sydney College, Russell’s work was by no means fairly as rugged or as brutal as that of a few of the different exponents. The entry path to the Jack Home even has a barely romantic contact, and his interiors have been typically extra subtle, containing the odd quirky component, and stylish, refined furnishings.

In 1957, I joined the John Allen and Russell C. Jack workplace as a third-year part-time scholar. I had beforehand labored at Fowell, Mansfield and Maclurcan, a comparatively giant and conservative agency, the place I had soaked up conventional detailing, however now thought a smaller workplace would supply extra drawing-board expertise. I arrived simply because the Jack Home was being accomplished and was blown away by a brand new means of seeing issues, a brand new view of structure. I used to be shortly given the expertise I sought, and each John and Russell have been wonderful and keen lecturers. Russell, specifically, was a constructive critic, with a pointy thoughts and a uncommon capacity to maneuver from the massive image to the element and easily convey his message.

A number of months later, I used to be joined within the workplace by two different pals and part-time college students, Brian Mazlin and Glenn Murcutt, they usually equally benefitted from Russell’s eager commentary and fixed steering. In her 1990 e book Australian Structure Since 1960, Jennifer Taylor states John Allen and Russell Jack taught Murcutt “the logic of constant development and the fixed care required in design particulars.”

I returned to the workplace of John Allen and Russell C. Jack in 1963, following a number of years in Europe. In that 12 months, the agency gained the Wilkinson Award for the Jacobs Home in Wahroonga, designed by Russell, a home targeted round an inside courtyard. In 1965 it gained the Canberra Medallion for Russell’s Cater Home in Crimson Hill, ACT.

Additionally in 1965, I turned a accomplice within the follow to type Allen Jack and Cottier and continued to obtain the advantage of Russell’s clever counsel and revel in his incisive, witty feedback on present structure – “Good style nothing” stays in my lexicon!

Russell had been instructing design because the early Sixties. His capacity as an educator shortly turned obvious, and in 1976 he retired from the agency to pursue a full-time educational profession as a senior lecturer on the College of New South Wales. He gained his grasp of structure diploma in 1980 and continued as a visiting professor till 1990. In his interval on the college, his self-effacing and gregarious nature made him immensely common together with his college students, who discovered him to be “an ideal instructor, enthusiastic and provoking.”

Whereas leaving a comparatively small physique of labor, Russell Jack has had a profound affect on a number of generations of architects, who will all, I’m certain, keep in mind him fondly.