Record drawings and presentation drawing, one dated 20 February 1818 (5)

Explore Collections

You are here: CollectionsOnline / Record drawings and presentation drawing, one dated 20 February 1818 (5)

Browse

The drawings from the office of Sir John Soane
- Public buildings
  - London: Royal Hospital, Chelsea for the Board of Commissioners, 1807-1835 (226)
    - Stables, October 1814 - July 1818 (25)

image Image 1 for SM (139) volume 76/77 (140) volume 60/123 (141) volume 60/124 (142) P387 (143) volume 79/6

image Image 2 for SM (139) volume 76/77 (140) volume 60/123 (141) volume 60/124 (142) P387 (143) volume 79/6

image Image 3 for SM (139) volume 76/77 (140) volume 60/123 (141) volume 60/124 (142) P387 (143) volume 79/6

image Image 4 for SM (139) volume 76/77 (140) volume 60/123 (141) volume 60/124 (142) P387 (143) volume 79/6

image Image 5 for SM (139) volume 76/77 (140) volume 60/123 (141) volume 60/124 (142) P387 (143) volume 79/6

Use of images and copyright
Enlarge this Image

Print this image in A4 view

Reference number

SM (139) volume 76/77 (140) volume 60/123 (141) volume 60/124 (142) P387 (143) volume 79/6

Purpose

Record drawings and presentation drawing, one dated 20 February 1818 (5)

Aspect

139 Pencil perspective of the north and west fronts 140 Perspective of the north side of the stables and internal yard, with surounding buildings, Chelsea 141 View of New Buildings at Chelsea Hospital 142 A view of the new buildings forming the principal alterations and additions in the / establishment of the Royal Hospital at Chelsea particularly those / noticed in the Champion [newspaper] of the tenth and twenty fourth of September MDCCCXV 143 Perspective of the west side of the stables with the new Infirmary in the foreground

Inscribed

139 labelled (pencil) bottom 141 as above, labelled (Sketch for a Large Drawing) 142 as above

Signed and dated

(140) 20 Feb: 1818 (141) 1818 (142) datable to c.1818

Hand

(139-141) Soane office (142) J.M. Gandy (1771-1843) (143) Soane office

Notes

Drawing 139 shows the north and west sides of the stables as well as the corner of the new Infirmary. Soane used blind arcading here again, the main feature of the stables, as Dean indicates 'symmetrically arranged arch-headed openings, all detailed in such a way as to create an appearance of general symmetry even if the exact disposition of doors and windows was uneven'. There are lunette windows on the two visible walls of the north-west corner (the loose box), only one of which is apparent on the previous elevations. The Infirmary has been erased and re-drawn further to the right.

Drawing 140 shows the north wall of the stables and looks into the stable yard, with the Wren buildings visible in the background and the new Infirmary to the side.

Drawing 141 includes Wren's main hospital buildings in the background and in the foreground, Soane's work: the new Stables, Infirmary and Clerk of Work's house. The view point is shown to be a high perspective, from the Paradise Row side.

Drawing 142 shows a very similar aspect to drawing 141 and is probably a worked up presentation drawing of the latter. The same buildings are shown but with the addition of figures: a Pensioner walking along Paradise Row next to the Infirmary wall, a figure turning into the stable road and a horse entering the gate. This perspectives also shows two Infirmaries - the north and south fronts - the latter above and in a fictional position. The Secretary's Offices can also be seen, though the work on the structure must still have been going on at this stage.
The drawings was exhibited at the Royal Academy in 1818 (No.908)

Drawing 143 shows the west wall of the stables and the south wall of the new Infirmary, with a garden to the Clerk of Works' House, in the foreground.

Literature

P. Dean, 'The Royal Hospital Chelsea I- Pre-1815' in Sir John Soane and London, 2006, p.66

Level

Drawing

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

If you have any further information about this object, please contact us: drawings@soane.org.uk

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.

Browse (via the vertical menu to the left) and search results for Drawings include a mixture of Concise catalogue records – drawn from an outline list of the collection – and fuller records where drawings have been catalogued in more detail (an ongoing process).