Born in Freshwater on the Isle of Wight to John Hooke, a local church curate, and Cecily Gyles. Frail health in childhood pushed him toward drawing, instruments, and patient observation rather than field labor.

After his father's death, he traveled to London and secured a place at Westminster School under headmaster Richard Busby. There he learned Latin, geometry, and mechanics, building small devices and cultivating a maker’s precision.

He entered Oxford and gravitated toward the circle of experimentalists around John Wilkins. The university’s workshops and libraries let him merge mathematics with hands-on instrument design at a formative stage of English science.

Working closely with Robert Boyle, he helped improve the vacuum air pump used for pioneering studies of gases. His mechanical skill and careful note-taking supported the experiments that fed into Boyle’s law and the new experimental method.

As scientific meetings in London coalesced into the Royal Society, he became central to organizing demonstrations and apparatus. His reliability in preparing experiments made him a key figure in the culture of public, repeatable proof.

The Royal Society named him Curator of Experiments, a demanding post requiring frequent new demonstrations for fellows and visitors. He designed instruments, proposed trials, and kept experimental life flowing in Restoration London.

He was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society, formalizing his status among England’s leading natural philosophers. The fellowship expanded his network with figures such as Christopher Wren and allowed wider influence on research priorities.

He published 'Micrographia,' a lavishly illustrated book presenting observations made with improved microscopes, including insects, plants, and textiles. Describing cork’s tiny chambers, he popularized the word 'cell' for biological structure.

Gresham College appointed him Professor of Geometry, giving him a London base for lectures and research. The position supported his wide-ranging work in mechanics, astronomy, surveying, and the practical mathematics of building.

After the Great Fire of London, he worked with Christopher Wren on rebuilding plans, property surveys, and street layouts. Their measurements and maps helped settle disputes and shaped a more orderly city through applied geometry.

He issued work on springs and elastic forces, associated with the principle that extension is proportional to load within limits. The idea became known as Hooke’s law, foundational for material science, engineering design, and later physics.

He worked on portable timekeepers and promoted the balance spring as a route to accurate watches, vital for navigation and astronomy. These efforts placed him in priority tensions with other horologists in London and on the Continent.

In 'An Attempt to Prove the Motion of the Earth,' he combined observational arguments with mechanical reasoning about celestial motions. He also discussed gravitational tendencies and orbital dynamics, foreshadowing debates that later erupted with Newton.

He exchanged letters with Isaac Newton about planetary motion, suggesting compounded motions and attractive forces toward the Sun. The correspondence became entangled with claims of priority, sharpening one of the era’s most famous scientific rivalries.

While maintaining his scientific duties, he contributed to building projects and city infrastructure, applying measurement and structural insight. His collaboration with Wren extended into practical architecture, including surveying and design oversight in London.

When Newton published 'Philosophiae Naturalis Principia Mathematica,' Hooke pressed claims that his earlier ideas anticipated aspects of universal gravitation. The dispute strained Royal Society relations and left Hooke increasingly isolated despite his contributions.

In later years he suffered painful illness while continuing to lecture, tinker with instruments, and keep extensive notes. Colleagues described him as brilliant but difficult, and his lack of published synthesis limited recognition of his breadth.

He died in London after decades at the center of English experimental science, leaving papers and instruments scattered rather than neatly curated. His work on elasticity, microscopy, and instrumentation endured, even as personal conflicts shadowed his memory.