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  • image SM 29/3/8v

Reference number

SM 29/3/8v

Purpose

[5] Presentation drawing, showing proposed design for alterations and additions to the north, 17 July 1788

Aspect

Ground floor plan

Scale

bar scale of 1/5 inch to 1 foot

Inscribed

Countess of Pembroke, Vestibule, Eating Room / 18'0" by 21'0", Library / 24'9" by 16'0", Drawing room / 17'9" by 22'0", ante-room, best staircase / 16'0" by 7'0", closet, water / closet, dimensions given, (pencil) 18 by 18 and calculations

Signed and dated

  • July 17th 1788, Welbeck Street July 17 1788

Medium and dimensions

Pencil, pen and grey and pink washes within double-ruled and wash border on laid paper with one fold mark (580 x 455)

Hand

attributed to John Sanders (pupil 1784-1790)

Watermark

J Whatman and fleur-de-lis over cartouche with ornate W below

Notes

John Sanders (Soane pupil 1784-90) delivered this drawing to Lady Pembroke on 18 July 1788. This design was estimated at £800, 'which was considerably more than she wished' (Journal No 1). According to Soane's Journal, a less costly design estimated at £500 was delivered the next day, but this too did not meet client's approval.

The drawing shows the ground floor design of a proposed house. The east entrance front is made symmetrical by the inclusion of a large eating room to the north of the entrance. The entrance is set behind a portico in-antis and between Venetian windows, one being blind and the other lighting the new eating room. The addition also includes a polygonal drawing room at the north-west corner, as in the design on the survey drawing (SM 29/3/5). A principal staircase is at the west wall but pencil alterations suggest moving the staircase to the centre of the plain, no doubt freeing up with west so that its vistas could be better-appreciated.

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.

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