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  • image SM volume 76/42

Reference number

SM volume 76/42

Purpose

[171] Record drawing, 4 November 1814

Aspect

Plan of part of the timbering of the / new Bake House at Chelsea Hospital

Scale

bar scale

Inscribed

as above

Signed and dated

  • E.F., November 4. 1814

Hand

Edward Foxhall (1793-1862, pupil 1812-1821)

Notes

The design for the Bakehouse roof shows a queen post structure with a with flat top. Interestingly this construction form was one that Wren often used, particularly at Chelsea (for the roof over the Great Hall). Soane also used it for his Stables (see SM volume 76/39). This form allows for comparatively steeply sloping sides and low profile roof.

Evidently, Soane had to create a structure with a flat top because it was to support a central chimney. Thus the supporting timbers had to be strong enough to bear the chimney's weight, so scissor braces were used for support across the width of two (of the four) sides between queen posts (as shown on the upper section of SM volume 76/41). The two shorter sides on the plan (this drawing) are those represented.

The lower section SM volume 76/41 shows the two longer spans between queen posts, shown on the plan (this drawing). The lower section of SM volume 76/41 ties the beams in, rather than providing much structural support. It measures about 17 feet across, which is approximate to the longer span between the queen posts shown on this drawing. SM volume 76/43 shows a detail of the roof's corner in plan and elevation.

SM volume 76/44 shows the plan - a two room, one-storey structure. One room was presumably a preparation space (with fireplace) whilst the other would have held the oven. The roof-beam dimensions roughly correspond to the plan.

Literature

D. Yeomans, The Trussed roof, its history and development, 1992, p.63

Level

Drawing

Digitisation of the Drawings Collection has been made possible through the generosity of the Leon Levy Foundation

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Sir John Soane's collection includes some 30,000 architectural, design and topographical drawings which is a very important resource for scholars worldwide. His was the first architect’s collection to attempt to preserve the best in design for the architectural profession in the future, and it did so by assembling as exemplars surviving drawings by great Renaissance masters and by the leading architects in Britain in the 17th and 18th centuries and his near contemporaries such as Sir William Chambers, Robert Adam and George Dance the Younger. These drawings sit side by side with 9,000 drawings in Soane’s own hand or those of the pupils in his office, covering his early work as a student, his time in Italy and the drawings produced in the course of his architectural practice from 1780 until the 1830s.

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