Louis Laybourne Smith - Teaching Career

Teaching Career

In 1903, Laybourne Smith was invited to lecture in mechanical engineering at the School of Mines—a position which Page states that Laybourne Smith was "delighted" to accept. He was thereafter elected as the school's registrar in 1905, and continued in that post full-time until 1914, after which he ran the school part-time until 1951. Even then, Laybourne Smith's involvement with the school did not end after Gavin Walkley took over, and he was still associated with the school when he died in 1965.

While working at the school, Laybourne Smith initiated his own classes on architecture, gathering "a group of colleagues who instructed one another" in the field. After being approached in 1906 by the Council of the School of Mines, Laybourne Smith teamed with Walter Bagot to develop a new architecture course. The result was a three-year part-time Associate Diploma, although students were still expected to be articled to professional architects in order to gain more practical experience in the field. By 1916 the course was regarded as of sufficient quality to place its students "in the same rank as architectural students in other parts of the world".

While the School of Mines no longer exists, the school of architecture founded by Laybourne Smith is now part of the University of South Australia, and since 1963 the Louis Laybourne Smith School of Architecture and Building has borne his name as its founder.