Approved design for Royal Galleries and Committee Rooms, 19 July 1823

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Sir John Soane office drawings: the drawings of Sir John Soane and the office of Sir John Soane
- Office of Works
  - London: Palace of Westminster: designs for alterations and additions, 1793-1828 (499)
    - London: House of Lords, Palace of Westminster: alterations and additions, 1817-28 (220)
      - Royal Gallery and Committee Rooms, 1823-24 (66)
        Designs for a Royal Gallery and Committee Rooms, July-August 1823

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Reference number

SM 71/2/81

Purpose

Approved design for Royal Galleries and Committee Rooms, 19 July 1823

Aspect

Plan of the House of Lords with new Royal Galleries and Committee Rooms

Scale

bar scale of 1/15 inch to 1 foot

Inscribed

labelled (pencil): (in Soane's hand, pen) Scala Regia, M^rs Wagners / Room (twice), Bishops / Stairs, Bishops / Waiting / Room, Entrance / Hall, Scullery, Wash / house, Archbishops / Stairs, M^rs Wagners / Kitchen, Open Yard, N^o 4 Committee / Rooms, His Majestys / Robing / Room, The House of Lords, Painted Ch[ambe]r, Centre of -------- (illegible), Area, Lobby to the / House of / Lords, House of Lords, Corridor leading to the / His Majestys Rob[in]^g Room, Great Cha[mber], (in Soane's hand) This plan submitted to / the Earl of Liverpool on / the 21 July 1823 at Fife / House & approved & directed to / be carried into execution as soon / as poss, Committee Room / 40 x 24, Library, 40 / 36

Signed and dated

19 July 1823
L Inn Fields 19 July 1823

Medium and dimensions

Pen, pencil, sepia, pink and blue washes, pricked for transfer with multi-ruled sepia and black wash border on wove paper (737 x 626)

Hand

Soane Office

Watermark

J Whatman Turkey Mill Kent

Notes

The first of Soane's second set of designs for a Royal Gallery draws on some elements of previous designs but includes the addition of a suite of Committee Rooms to the east of the site, towards the river. The new design includes a vestibule at the top of the Scala Regia which leads into a square ante-room. From here a left turn can be taken into a three-bay gallery. The processional route continues into the Painted Chamber. Designs made in December 1822 also show the gallery as consisting of three bays although in the latest design the gallery appears to be narrower. Parallel to this gallery on the other side of an open area are five Committee Rooms. The design also seems to include, in pencil, to the right of the drawing, a new House of Lords with lobby and 'corridor to His Majesty's robing room'. The Royal Entrance and Scala Regia, completed in February 1823, are shown to the left of the drawing (west of the new additions) and the House of Lords is the large, thick-walled chamber in the centre of the sheet. According to Soane's note the drawing was submitted to the Prime Minister, Lord Liverpool, and approved on 21 July 1823 'to be carried into execution as soon as poss[ible]'.

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).