Mills, Peter

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Mills, Peter (1598–1670). English architect, brickmaker, builder, and surveyor. He was involved with Inigo Jones concerning the Church of St Michael-le-Querne, London (1638), and appears to have designed houses on the south side of Great Queen Street, Lincoln's Inn Fields, London (c.1640—an early example of uniform elevations for a group of London houses—demolished), and elsewhere in the capital. His greatest work was Thorpe Hall, Peterborough, Northants. (1653–6), a major monument of astylar Artisan Mannerism and the Protectorate style. He may also have designed Wisbech Castle, Cambs. (c.1658—demolished). With May, Pratt, and Wren he was one of the Surveyors employed to supervise the rebuilding of the City of London after the Great Fire (1666). His later work has something of the style of May and Pratt: at Cobham Hall, Kent (1661–3), for example, there was hardly a trace of Artisan Mannerism.

Bibliography

Colvin (1995);
Mowl & Earnshaw (1995);
W. Papworth (1852)