Architectural and ornamental sculptor. The earliest recorded work by Daymond seems to be the elaborate foliage carving on the Union Club (originally Thatched House Club), St James’s Street, London (architect Knowles, 1862). A fireplace by ‘Daymond of London’ is at Thoresby, Lincs., built 1865–75 by Anthony Salvin. From around 1880, the name occurs frequently in connection with architectural projects in London. The architects with whom Daymond’s firm chiefly worked were John Norton, Davis and Emmanuel, Treadwell and Martin, Sir H. Tanner, G. Sherrin, and F.W. Marks. Already in 1881, in connection with their largest endeavour, the figurative sculpture on Davis and Emmanuel’s City of London School, it is referred to as J. Daymond and Son. The firm continued active under this name up to 1935 at its address in Edward Street, Vincent Square, Westminster. Advertisements for its products between 1901 and 1907, in the magazine Academy Architecture, include photographic illustrations of the workshop, with stone-carvers at work.
Bibliography: T. Cavanagh, Public Sculpture of Kensington and Chelsea with Westminster South-West, Watford, 2023, pp. 450, 451; P. Ward-Jackson, Public Sculpture of the City of London, Liverpool, 2003, pp. 4–5, 108, 395, 397, 421–22, 424–26; P. Ward-Jackson, Public Sculpture of Historic Westminster. Volume 1, Liverpool, 2011, pp. 22–24, 113; plus various volumes of Pevsner Architectural Guides (The Buildings of England); Post Office London Directory.
Philip Ward-Jackson February 2023