Michael Searles

Regency architect Michael Searles was famous as an English commercial architect of large houses, particularly in London. His most notable achievement is perhaps The Paragon in Blackheath. Searles was the son of a Greenwich surveyor, also named Michael Searles, who served as surveyor to Morden College in Blackheath. The Searles formed an unofficial father and son partnership producing plans in and around Greenwich before Searles junior set up his own practice. Landowner John Cator granted development leases to Searles and builder William Dyer to design and build a series of high quality dwellings, intended to appeal to upper middle class buyers, situated on the south-east side of Blackheath. Facing the heath, South Row and Montpelier Row were erected from 1794 to 1805. However, Searles' masterpiece was the adjacent Paragon, a 14-house perfect crescent occupying a semicircular plot in the corner of the Heath. The Paragon comprises seven blocks of semi-detached houses, each linked by a single story colonnade, with a lodge house at each end.