(b London, 15 Feb 1809; d London, 19 April 1874). English architect and designer. The son of a Welsh antiquary and furrier of the same name, Owen Jones was educated at Charterhouse School, London, before becoming a pupil of the architect Lewis Vuillamy (1791-1871). Following his apprenticeship he set out in 1832 for the Continent on a Grand Tour. In Greece Jones met Jules Goury (1803-34), a young French architect; both travellers had become fascinated by Classical architectural polychromy. In order to pursue this study further they visited Egypt, Turkey and Spain, where they undertook a detailed survey of the Alhambra. After Goury died of cholera in 1834, Jones completed their research, finally printing and publishing it himself as Plans, Elevations, Sections and Details of the Alhambra (2 vols; London, 1842-5). His initial publication of the work in 1836-7 was never completed, but the three numbers that appeared (out of ten planned) were the first examples of chromolithography of any consequence to appear in Britain. This quickly led to other similar work for commercial publishers, such as an illuminated edition of J. G. Lockhart's Ancient Spanish Ballads (London, 1841). Until the mid-1850s, when his expanding architectural practice would no longer permit it, Jones was as much a printer as an architect.
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