O'Donnell, who studied at the University of Cambridge,1 has Master of Arts and Ph.D degrees.2
From 1975 to 1978, he worked as a research assistant in Dublin for the Pevsner Architectural Guides 'Buildings of Ireland' series.3 From 1982, O'Donnell worked as an inspector at English Heritage and the public bodies that preceded it.4
He was elected a Fellow of the Society of Antiquaries of London in 1999.5
Since 2011, O'Donnell has worked as an architectural historian in a private capacity. He has written in academic journals and has also contributed to The Catholic Herald.6 He has given talks and lectures, for example, on Augustus Pugin at the University of Malta,7 and on the history, art and architecture of Buckfast Abbey.8[dead link]
Some photographs, attributed to O'Donnell, are in the Conway Library at the Courtauld Institute of Art.9
"Contributors — Department of Architecture". www.arct.cam.ac.uk. 23 September 2014. Retrieved 2021-02-26. https://www.arct.cam.ac.uk/courses/postgraduate/mst-building-history-1/contributors-1 ↩
"Dr Roderick O'Donnell". Society of Antiquaries of London. Retrieved 2021-02-26. https://www.sal.org.uk/our-fellows/directory/dr-roderick-odonnell/ ↩
"Notes on Contributors", Architectural History - Journal of the Society of Architectural Historians of Great Britain (Volume 44, 2001) (PDF), Cambridge University Press, p. Xii, doi:10.1017/S0066622X00007620, O'Donnell [..] was research assistant in Dublin for the Buildings of Ireland 1975—78 [..] He has been an inspector with English Heritage and its predecessor bodies since 1982 https://www.cambridge.org/core/services/aop-cambridge-core/content/view/1F6BE23EF02C394A66E418D0E7C01D26/S0066622X00007620a.pdf/arh_volume_44_cover_and_front_matter.pdf ↩
O'Donnell, Roderick (2019-06-06). "Debunking the myth of Newman and Notre-Dame". Catholic Herald. Retrieved 2021-03-01. https://catholicherald.co.uk/debunking-the-myth-of-newman-and-notre-dame/ ↩
"International lecture series by History of Art Department". timesofmalta.com. 10 May 2014. Retrieved 14 January 2025. The third lecture by Roderick O'Donnell [..] dealt with Augustus Welby Pugin as an architect to the Catholic Revival. https://timesofmalta.com/article/International-lecture-series-by-History-of-Art-Department.518735 ↩
"Buckfast Abbey Book - History, Art and Architecture". www.buckfast.org.uk. Retrieved 2021-03-01. https://www.buckfast.org.uk/abbeybook ↩
"Who made the Conway Library?". Digital Media. 2020-06-30. Archived from the original on 2020-07-03. Retrieved 2021-03-01. https://web.archive.org/web/20200703211341/http://blog.courtauld.ac.uk/digitalmedia/2020/06/30/who-made-the-conway-library/ ↩
O'Donnell, Roderick (2001). "Extra Illustrations of Pugin Buildings in TH Kings Les Vrais Principes". Architectural History. 44: 57–63. doi:10.2307/1568734. JSTOR 1568734. S2CID 192236773. /wiki/Doi_(identifier) ↩
"JSTOR: Search Results". www.jstor.org. Retrieved 2021-03-01. https://www.jstor.org/action/doBasicSearch?si=1&Query=au:%22Roderick+O%27Donnell%22&refreqid=search:46d70e236e782958c852edd194eb03a3 ↩