Joseph Arthur Reeve was born in at Yarrow Bank in Kingswear, Devon, England in 1850 and was articled to E. J. Turner. He then worked in the office of William Burges (1827-1881) in London.
Reeve practised as an architect in London from the 1870s onwards and specialised in ecclesiastical commissions. In 1873 Burges recommended him to the Marquess of Ripon to survey and make drawings of the ruins of Fountain's Abbey, which resulted in a folio volume containing 46 plates, a general plan of the abbey, sketches of conjectural restoration of various parts of the building, historical notes, and a full description. This was printed by Sprague, and issued to subscribers in 1892. Other work by Reeve included the restoration of Ramsbury, formerly the Cathedral church of the diocese of Sarum, and the design and construction of the memorial of the five Archbishops of Canterbury (Maimers Sutton, Howley, Sumner, Longley, and Tait) buried in Addington churchyard in Addington, Buckinghamshire.
Reeve died in Kingswear on 15 May 1915.
Directory of British Architects 1834-1914. Compiled by Antonia Brodie, et al. Volume 2: L-Z. London; New York: British Architectural Library, Royal Institute of British Architects/Continuum, 2001
Barrie, Peter. ‘J. A. Reeve, St Mark’s Church & Salisbury’ Ecclesiology Today no.32, January 2004 pp.24-39
‘Obituary’. The Builder vol. 108, 21 May 1915 p. 487
‘Obituary’. Royal Institute of British Architects Journal vol. 22, 1915 p. 426