Biography
After an undergraduate degree in architecture at Cambridge (Trinity College) and Diploma at University College, London, I worked in London for the Shankland Cox Partnership on housing and for Colin St John Wilson and Partners on the British Library (Bloomsbury).
On returning to Cambridge in 1973 I practised within Hughes and Bicknell Architects, where I became an Associate and later Partner, before founding Nicholas Ray Associates in 1989. The name changed to NRAP in 2007 and on my retirement from practice has been re-named with the initials of the two remaining Directors (O & W). My most prominent buildings in Cambridge were the Quayside Development, opposite Magdalene College, and major additions to the Department of Chemistry. I was responsible for new and refurbishment projects for numerous Colleges, as well as buildings and projects for the University and for private clients.
I was first appointed to an Assistant Lectureship in 1974, and thereafter my teaching was primarily focused on the studio. By the time I retired as Reader, in addition to numerous journal articles I had published Cambridge Architecture, a Concise Guide (Cambridge University Press 1995), Architecture and its Ethical Dilemmas (Routledge 2005) and Alvar Aalto (Yale University Press 2005).
Subsequent publications include: Rafael Moneo (Yale University Press 2015) with Francisco González de Canales, Philosophy of Architecture (Cambridge Architectural Press 2014, also in Chinese parallel translation, University of Liverpool Press 2019) with Christian Illies, and Thinking Through Twentieth-Century Architecture (2023, Routledge)
I am currently an Honorary Visiting Professor in Architectural Theory at the University of Liverpool.
