People:
- John Godwin (archive creator)
- Gillian Hopwood (archive creator)
- Godwin and Hopwood (Firm) (archive creator)
Title:
Gillian Hopwood and John Godwin fonds
Form:
archives
Level of archival description:
Fonds
Scope and content:
The Gillian Hopwood and John Godwin fonds documents Hopwood and Godwin’s architectural projects from the early 1950s to the late 1980s, as well as their training to become architects, the administration of their architecture practice, and their career as architectural consultants, and their writing from the 1940s to 2023. The fonds mostly contains material related to their architectural projects, over 450 of them, mostly in Nigeria and some from their practice in the United Kingdom. These projects include private residences and housing developments, factory buildings, offices and commercial buildings, school buildings, such as primary and secondary schools, and well as and higher education buildings. These projects are documented through plans and sketches, as well as through textual records which often include correspondence, meeting minutes, reports, contracts, documents related to tenders, and financial documents.
Documenting John Godwin and Gillian Hopwood’s work as consultants after their retirement in 1989 are plans and correspondence, as well as office records, promotional material, and reference material used in the office for projects or for practice management. Both John Godwin and Gillian Hopwood’s professional activities with architecture associations, attendance to conferences or congresses, or participation in committees are also recorded in this archive through correspondence, meeting minutes, reports and event programs. This includes John Godwin’s work for Legacy, a non-profit organization run by volunteers working to preserve and promote historical monuments and buildings in Nigeria. It also records their writing activities, with draft and final versions of articles or other texts and correspondence, as well as the teaching of John Godwin at the University of Lagos, with syllabi, research and notes, and administrative documents from the university.
Documents relating to their own training as architects at the Architectural Association School of Architecture (the AA) in London from 1945 to 1950 consists mainly of John Godwin’s student work like drawings and sketches for design assignments, and notes.
The fonds also documents Gillian Hopwood’s work as a photographer with a small collection of booklets of negatives of photographs taken during their last years as students and their travels in Europe from 1948 to 1954, as well as their early years and career in Nigeria from 1956 to 1961.
Arrangement:
The fonds is divided in seven series: AP218.S1 Architectural project; AP218.S2 Office records; AP218.S3 Professional associations and committees; AP218.S4 Writings; AP218.S5 John Godwin’s teaching and lectures; AP218.S6 Gillian Hopwod’s photography; and AP218.S7 John Godwin’s student work.
While the material in this archive has been intellectually arrangement under each of these series created by the archivist during processing, the physical original order of the material has been maintained.
Biographical notes:
Gillian Hopwood and John Godwin were both British architects based in Nigeria. Gillian Hopwood was born in Rochdale, in the Greater Manchester area, in the United Kingdom in 1927. She often went by either Jillian or Jill Hopwood during her life and career. William John Gilbert Godwin was born in 1928 in Chalfon St Giles in the southeast of Buckinghamshire, in the United Kingdom. When studying architecture or early in his career, he more often used the first names William and Gilbert but later settled on John Godwin. Hopwood and Godwin both started studying in 1945 at the Architectural Association School of Architecture (the AA) in London and graduated in 1950. They married the next year, in 1951. They had two children, Tony and Carey. After their graduation, Gillian Hopwood worked at the office of architect Alister MacDonald on a project in Cyprus, while John Godwin served as a subaltern to the Royal Engineers at Chatham [1]. They also submitted entries in national architectural competitions to gain experience and collaborated with Stephen Macfarlane, a fellow graduate from the Architectural Association School of Architecture, on the designs of private houses. [2] In 1954, they moved to Lagos, Nigeria, which at the time was still under British colonial authority (Nigeria gained its independence in 1960), and worked for Architects CoPartnership (APC). A year later, in 1955, they started their own practice, Godwin and Hopwood Architects, in Onikan, on Lagos Island, in Nigeria [3]. Their practice started by undertaking mostly projects in Lagos, but with time expanded across Nigeria, and led to the creation of firm offices in Kaduna, Kano, Jos, Maiduguri, and Warri. [4] John Godwin was the principal associate who toured between these other firm’s offices across Nigeria. He was also mostly responsible for “the allocation of the workload as well as heading design, research and training.” [5] Gillian Hopwood mostly acted as firm’s administrator but always remained involved in the design process of projects, as she “[…] always had, a building design on her drawing board.” [6] Early on after their arrival, Gillian Hopwood started documenting the city and its architecture by taking photographs. [7] Introduced to photography at the age of 8, she learned from her father, also a keen photographer, to develop her own film, print and enlarge negatives. [8] “This became a useful adjunct to her architectural training which involved visiting and recording buildings as she was able to sell some of her work to the executive architects, many of whom were well known.” [9] At the same time as being involved in architectural projects with John Godwin at their firm, her career also focused on preservation of historical buildings and documenting colonial buildings in Lagos through photography.
Godwin and Hopwood Architects designed over 1000 building in Nigeria, ranging from residential, educational, commercial, industrial, and community projects. A common trend through nearly all of Godwin and Hopwood’s projects in Nigeria was a care for designing building adapted to the environmental conditions. The inclusion of louvre windows, sun breakers, or other passive structural cooling techniques, to control sunlight and wind circulation, are a frequent feature in Godwin and Hopwood’s designs.
Early in their career in Nigeria, Godwin and Hopwood Architects were commission by the Federal Ministry of Education, while still under British rule, to build a series of schools in Lagos from 1956 to 1958, including the Anglican School on Broad Street (1956) and the Christ Church Cathedral School also on Broad Street (1956). The firm’s involvement in educational building design went beyond just building, but also established architectural and design standards to be used across the country. This happened mostly in the context of the collaboration of the firm with the International Development Association (IDA) in the 1960s. Godwin and Hopwood Architects were also commissioned by many other large higher education projects, like college and university complexes by the Nigerian state governments, mostly after independence in 1960. This included the University of Lagos Science Complex in Lagos (1971) and the North East College of Arts and Science (NECAS) (later known as the University of Maiduguri) in Maiduguri (1971).
The firm also counts many factories and commercial buildings in their portfolio, such as Bookshop House building in Lagos (1973) or their work on the planning of the residential and industrial estate Agbara Estate in Agbara (1973). This project led the firm to securing more commissions from manufacturers establishing factories on the estate. The firm’s work for corporate entities included many projects for British companies or subsidiaries of British companies. During the colonial period, the British colonial power in its Nigerian colonies was based on a model of indirect rule through corporate entities: British imperial companies were granted charter rights by the British Crown who depended on them to govern their colonies. [10] Companies like United African Company (UAC) and John Holt were amongst these companies. [11] Godwin and Hopwood were commissioned by these companies for many projects, mostly in postcolonial Nigeria. Many remained in activity in Nigeria after the independence.
Soon after the establishment of their office in Lagos, Godwin and Hopwood’s firm became a training hub for young Nigerian architects. Architect Frank Mbanefo was the first Nigerian architect hired by Godwin and Hopwood, and other Nigerian architects also started their career there. [12] By the second half of the 1980s, as clients were more and more prioritizing the hiring of Nigerian architects and architectural firms, the foreign industrial investment was diminishing, and the Nigerian government was restrained by a deficit budget, Godwin and Hopwood Architect’s commissions began slowing down [13]. For this reason, they opened an office in Clerkenwell, on Old Street, in London, to work on projects in Europe, but mostly in the United Kingdom. In 1989, Godwin and Hopwood Architects merged with another architectural firm, Tunde Kuye and Associates, to become GHK Architects. At that time, Godwin and Hopwood started focusing more on consulting on architectural work and less on designing and managing entire projects, while the firm’s London office was taken over by their son, Tony Godwin. [14] GHK Architects is still in practice as of 2026, with Abiola Fayem as its principal. The 1990s and 2000s were also a period where Hopwood and Godwin became more involved in historical building restoration projects. This included John Godwin’s involvement in 1991 in the creation of Legacy – The Historical and Environmental Interest Group of Nigeria: a non-profit organization run by volunteers working to preserve and promote historical monuments and buildings in Nigeria. Legacy became a legal entity in 1995. In the context of his work with Legacy, Godwin’s work on Jaekel House on the site previously belonging to the Nigerian Railway Corporation in Ebute Matta, in the greater area of Lagos on the mainland.
John Godwin becomes professor in the Architecture Department at the University of Lagos in 1999 until he retired in 2010. [16] In 2013, Hopwood and Godwin became Nigerian citizens. Their career then focused more on writing books, such as “The Architecture of Demas Nwoko, Sandbank City: Lagos at 150” and “A Photographer’s Odyssey: Lagos Island 1954” published in 2015. [17] Gillian Hopwood’s photographic work was also presented in a photography exhibition in 2015 at The Wheatbaker Hotel in Ikoyi, Lagos. They moved back to England in 2017. John Godwin died February 12, 2023. Gillian Hopwood died November 6, 2025.
Sources:
[1] John Godwin and Gillian Hopwood, Permitted Architects: An Introduction to the Practice Archive of Joh Godwin and Gillian Hopwood (unpublished manuscript, Gillian Hopwood and John Godwin fonds, 2022), p. 4.
[2] Idem
[3] “Gillian Hopwood,” The Wheatbaker: The Art of Hospitality, accessed February 21, 2025, https://thewheatbakerlagos.com/artists/gillian-hopwood/
[4] Idem
[5] Ibid, p. 6.
[6] Idem
[7] Okechukwu Uwaezuoke, “Gillian Hopwood: Chronicles of a City in Transition,” This Day Live, March 22, 2015, accessed February 21, 2025, https://web.archive.org/web/20151003083415/http://www.thisdaylive.com/articles/gillian-hopwood-chronicles-of-a-city-in-transition/204735/.
[8] “Gillian Hopwood,” The Wheatbaker: The Art of Hospitality, last accessed February 21, 2025, https://thewheatbakerlagos.com/artists/gillian-hopwood/
[9] Idem
[10] Maiangwa, Benjamin, Muhammad Dan Suleiman, and Chigbo Arthur Anyaduba, "The Nation as Corporation: British Colonialism and the Pitfalls of Postcolonial Nationhood in Nigeria," Peace and Conflict Studies, Vol. 25, No. 1, page 2.
[11] Michele Tenzon, Ewan Harrison, Iain Jackson, Claire Tunstall, and Rixt Woudstra, “Reworking, Recaptioning, Moving Beyond, n.d., accessed 16 March 2026, https://www.cca.qc.ca/en/articles/90189/a-matter-of-terms
[12] Abigail Duke, “Weaving Modernity and Tradition,” n.d., accessed 11 September 2025, https://www.cca.qc.ca/en/articles/99051/weaving-modernity-and-tradition
[13] John Godwin and Gillian Hopwood, Permitted Architects: An Introduction to the Practice Archive of Joh Godwin and Gillian Hopwood (unpublished manuscript, Gillian Hopwood and John Godwin fonds, 2022), p. 39.
[14] Idem
[15] “Professor John Godwin, 1928-2023,” Legacy 1995, accessed February 24 2025, https://legacy1995.ng/2023/02/20/professor-john-godwin/
[16] Ibid
[17] “Gillian Hopwood,” The Wheatbaker: The Art of Hospitality, accessed February 21 2025, https://thewheatbakerlagos.com/artists/gillian-hopwood/
Conditions governing access:
- The CCA collection is open to everyone. We only ask that you reach out to us at ref@cca.qc.ca and make an appointment in advance so we have the time to properly prepare your resources. Digital material can only be accessed on-site. Please contact Reference at ref@cca.qc.ca for more information.
Digital material can only be accessed on site via CCA's digital archives access interface. Login required. Please contact Reference at ref@cca.qc.ca for more information.
Conditions governing reproduction:
- For copyright information or permission to reproduce material from the fonds, please contact the CCA (reproductions@cca.qc.ca).
Immediate source of acquisition or transfer:
- Gift of The Estate of John Godwin and Gillian Hopwood of September 11th, 2024.
Custodial history:
- The Gillian Hopwood and John Godwin fonds material was mostly kept in Godwin Hopwood Architects’s offices in Lagos, Nigeria. Many of these documents would have followed Hopwood and Godwin as they travelled often between their offices in Nigeria, but also in their secondary residences in Switzerland and the United Kingdom. Before their transfer to the CCA, the material was kept at Hopwood and Godwin’s residence in Cheltenham, Gloucestershire, United Kingdom. Materials had been meticulously organized by Gillian Hopwood during their in-office use.
Archivist's note:
- The Gillian Hopwood and John Godwin fonds was processed by Catherine Jacob, a francophone archivist of French-Canadian descent, from March 2025 to May 2026. Her work included creating a file-level finding aid, rehousing the fonds materials, and assisting with providing access to the fonds materials for the 2027-2028 exhibition series Out of the Box on Godwin and Hopwood.
Credit line:
Gillian Hopwood and John Godwin fonds
Collection Centre Canadien d'Architecture/
Canadian Centre for Architecture, Montréal;
Don de la succession de John Godwin et Gillian Hopwood/
Gift of The Estate of John Godwin and Gillian Hopwood
