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  • image Image 1 for SM (18) volume 74/108 (19) volume 74/109 (20) volume 74/128 (21) volume 74/131
  • image Image 2 for SM (18) volume 74/108 (19) volume 74/109 (20) volume 74/128 (21) volume 74/131
  • image Image 3 for SM (18) volume 74/108 (19) volume 74/109 (20) volume 74/128 (21) volume 74/131
  • image Image 4 for SM (18) volume 74/108 (19) volume 74/109 (20) volume 74/128 (21) volume 74/131
  • image Image 1 for SM (18) volume 74/108 (19) volume 74/109 (20) volume 74/128 (21) volume 74/131
  • image Image 2 for SM (18) volume 74/108 (19) volume 74/109 (20) volume 74/128 (21) volume 74/131
  • image Image 3 for SM (18) volume 74/108 (19) volume 74/109 (20) volume 74/128 (21) volume 74/131
  • image Image 4 for SM (18) volume 74/108 (19) volume 74/109 (20) volume 74/128 (21) volume 74/131

Reference number

SM (18) volume 74/108 (19) volume 74/109 (20) volume 74/128 (21) volume 74/131

Purpose

Working drawings for later south-east Transfer Office basement, 12,17 February and 13 June 1818 (4)

Aspect

18-21 Plans

Scale

(18-21) bar scale

Inscribed

18 Plan of the Basement Storey under the 'Reduced Office', The Bank of England and some dimensions given 19 Plan of the Basement Story 3 per Cent Reduced annuity Office, The Bank of England and some dimensions given 20 Part of the Foundation in the / 4Pr Ct Office, The Bank of England and some dimensions given 21 Plan of the Foundations in the / '£4 pr. Cent Office', The Bank of England and some dimensions given

Signed and dated

  • (18) 12th January 1818 (19) 17 Feb: 1818 (20) 21st May 1818 / HB (21) 13 June 1818

Hand

(18-19, 21) Soane office (20) H. Burges (pupil 1817-1820)

Notes

Drawing 18 is for the basement of the later south-east Transfer Office. It includes two different sets of inscribed dimensions (some in pencil and some in pen) by different hands. The pen dimensions appear to be in the same hand as the written inscription. There are also two pencil sketch elevations - one showing a wide foundation arch over piers.

Drawing 19 is similar to drawing 18 but a doorway on the left has been introduced (the grey wash of the walls has been erased) and a doorway which must have originally been intended on the right-hand side has been filled in, in slightly darker grey wash. However, the final position of the door is in the same position as drawing 18.

In each of the corners of the plan in drawing 19 there are small squares, coloured blue. As noted for the Consols Transfer Office, drawings 17-22 q.v., Soane used iron 'straps' to add support for the dome of that Office. C.R. Cockerell (1788-1863) (Soane's successor at the Bank) described 'An iron strap' which was 'passed behind and along the diagonal ridge, separating the spandrels or segments of the groin, and attached to the central end of the ridge and carried down under the stones of the impost pier, in order that their weight might tie that end of the iron securely, and resist any shrinking of the groin'. It seems that the four coloured squares may denote iron supports, as suggested by Abramson for the Consols Transfer Office, carried 'down under the stones of the impost pier'.

Drawings 20 and 21, although dated later, correspond to these foundation surveys and perhaps show Soane's final design for shoring up Taylor's foundations. The main difference appears to be two additional lengths of stone foundation between the main arches, which must have originally been the foundations supporting Taylor's columns on those lengths of the hall (Soane no longer required them).

Literature

D. Abramson, 'C.R. Cockerell's architectural progress of the Bank of England', Journal of the Society of Architectural Historians of Great Britain, volume 37, 1994, p.125

Level

Drawing

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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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