lit a candle 3h ago100 years old. That's a full life, well lived. Thinking of his wife Libby and their children Robert, Christopher and Hilary tonight.
Their story
Sir Donald William Insall was a British architect, conservationist and author who helped define modern architectural conservation in Britain after the Second World War. He died in London on 10 October 2026 at the age of 100. Born in Bristol on 7 February 1926 into a family of leather and…
Sir Donald William Insall was a British architect, conservationist and author who helped define modern architectural conservation in Britain after the Second World War. He died in London on 10 October 2026 at the age of 100.
Born in Bristol on 7 February 1926 into a family of leather and trunk makers, Insall attended Bristol Grammar School and watched his father commission a new family house at Henleaze. The Blitz's destruction of Bristol's churches and historic fabric shaped his vocation. He began architectural studies in 1942 at the Royal West of England Academy School of Architecture, interrupted by service with the Coldstream Guards, and finished after demobilisation in 1948. Further study followed at the Royal Academy and the School of Planning. As a Lethaby Scholar of the Society for the Protection of Ancient Buildings he worked with traditional craftsmen and spent eighteen months measuring Winchester College for the medieval historian John Harvey.
After time with London country-house practice Phillimore and Jenkins, Insall founded Donald Insall Associates in 1958 with fellow SPAB scholar Peter Locke, starting from a kitchen table off Belgrave Square. Early work included the rescue of Baroque Wotton House in Buckinghamshire. His 1968 study of Chester, based on visits to more than four hundred buildings, became an international landmark in urban conservation and led to his appointment as the city's conservation consultant from 1960 to 1978, a model later copied elsewhere. He was a founding commissioner of English Heritage in 1984 and numbered among his friends John Summerson, Nikolaus Pevsner and John Betjeman.
Projects associated with Insall and his practice ranged from Windsor Castle after the 1992 fire to Kelmscott Manor, Kedleston Hall, Somerset House, the Palace of Westminster, and the Battle of Britain Monument in London. He distinguished conservation from mere preservation, arguing that old buildings should be helped to live on usefully. That philosophy was set out in Living Buildings (2008; reissued 2018 with a foreword by the Prince of Wales). He retired as practice chairman in 1998 but remained a consultant. Honours included OBE (1981), CBE (1995), a knighthood (2010), the freedom of Chester (1999), Europa Nostra's Medal of Honour, and a Lifetime Achievement Award at the Architect of the Year Awards in 2024. He celebrated his 100th birthday on 7 February 2026.
Insall lived on Kew Green and was known for arriving at his Mayfair office on a BMW 750 motorcycle. He is survived by his wife, Libby, and their children Robert, Christopher and Hilary. Donald Insall Associates announced his death on 11 October 2026.
Biography adapted from Donald Insall Associates tribute (11 Oct 2026); Building Design; Wikipedia (Donald Insall).
In their own words
“Preservation is what you do for marmalade. Conservation means working with old buildings, streets and towns in ways that allow them to live on usefully.”
“We always try to make friends with the building itself, but also with its current users, so that both their respective needs can be met.”
Photos
1Sir Donald Insall
by People Forever
such a good run, and it sounds like he never stopped working either