Presentation drawings showing alternative designs for the façades, May 1823 and revised in 1825 (2)

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Sir John Soane office drawings: the drawings of Sir John Soane and the office of Sir John Soane
- Bank of England
  - Bank of England, City of London for the Governor and Company of the Bank of England, 1788-1834 (1352)
    - 1817-1833 Rebuilding of offices in the south-east and the façade, temporary office spaces and presentation drawings (219)
      - East, south and west façades, 1823-1828 (54)

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Reference number

SM (1) 9/2/2 (2) 9/2/1

Purpose

Presentation drawings showing alternative designs for the façades, May 1823 and revised in 1825 (2)

Aspect

1 Plan with laid out elevations 2 Plan with laid out elevations; elevation of the south-east corner

Scale

(1-2) bar scale

Inscribed

1 The Bank of England, Elevation of the Front next Threadneedle Street shewing the proposed alterations, Elevation of the Front of the Bank next Threadneedle Street, Threadneedle Street, Entrance (twice), Elevation of the Front next S^tBartholomew's Lane shewing the proposed alterations, Elevation of the Front next S^tBartholomew's Lane, S^tBartholomew's Lane, Lothbury, Elevation of the Front next Princes Street shewing the proposed alterations, Elevation of the Front of the Bank next Princes Street 2 The Bank of England, Elevation of the Front of the Bank next Threadneedle Street, Threadneedle Street, Entrance (twice), Elevation of the Front next S^tBartholomew's Lane shewing the proposed alterations, Elevation of the Front next S^tBartholomew's Lane, S^tBartholomew's Lane, Entrance to the Rotunda, Lothbury, Elevation of the Front next Princes Street shewing the proposed alterations, Elevation of the Front of the Bank next Princes Street, Princes Street, (pencil) 420

Signed and dated

(1) Lincolns Inn Fields / May 1823 (2) Lincolns Inn Fields / May 1823

Hand

(1) Soane office (2) Soane office and Soane

Watermark

(1) James Whatman Turkey Mill Kent 1821 (2) (obscured by conservation efforts)

Notes

Drawings 1 and 2 show the Bank's exterior wall in plan and elevation. Above the elevations of the existing south, east and west fronts are elevations of the proposed designs. Soane did not intend to rebuild the exterior wall on Lothbury Street, and the northern segments of the Bartholomew Lane and Princes Street fronts, which he had built in 1797 and c. 1805 (see schemes 2:5 and 3:4).

The elevation of the Threadneedle Street front in drawing 2 was probably made in 1825 and pasted to the 1823 presentation drawing. It probably accompanied Soane's presentation to the Building Committee in February 1825. Soane had intended to retain George Sampson's Entrance Building but in 1825 he found the façade in a poorer state than expected, necessitating either a refacing or complete reconstruction. In February 1825 alternative models were presented to the Building Committee and members of the Court of Directors, and after several revisions the designs were approved.

The 1823 drawings are similar to designs made between 1814 and 1818 (see scheme 4:2). Drawings 1 and 2 show alternative designs for the attic on Threadneedle Street and Bartholomew Lane.

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.

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).