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Soane office, design for a British Senate House made from drawings done in Rome, 1779: bird's-eye view
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Joseph Michael Gandy ARA (1771 - 1843)
Soane office, design for a British Senate House made from drawings done in Rome, 1779: bird's-eye view
Watercolour on paper
Museum number: P254
On display: North Drawing Room
All spaces are in No. 13 Lincoln's Inn Fields unless identified as in No. 12, Soane's first house.
For tours https://www.soane.org/your-visit
Curatorial note
Soane produced this design for a British Senate House while in Rome on his grand tour in 1779, at the same time producing a plan for a Royal Palace on an equally imperial scale (see SM P )
In his later publication, Designs for Public and Private Buildings, 1828 he wrote of this design, It is a study made without regard to expense, or limits as to space, in the gay morning of youthful fancy, amid all the wild imagination of an enthusiastic mind, animated by the contemplation of the majestic ruins of the sublime works of imperial Rome.
Soane hung this perspective of the Senate House in his North Drawing Room, paired with a plan for the same building (SM P261). Both are later re-drawings, this one by Joseph Michael Gandy and the plan by George Bailey.
In his later publication, Designs for Public and Private Buildings, 1828 he wrote of this design, It is a study made without regard to expense, or limits as to space, in the gay morning of youthful fancy, amid all the wild imagination of an enthusiastic mind, animated by the contemplation of the majestic ruins of the sublime works of imperial Rome.
Soane hung this perspective of the Senate House in his North Drawing Room, paired with a plan for the same building (SM P261). Both are later re-drawings, this one by Joseph Michael Gandy and the plan by George Bailey.
Exhibition history
Visions of World Architecture: John Soane's Royal Academy Lecture Illustrations, Sir John Soane's Museum, London, 12 January - 28 April 2007
Associated items
P254 North Drawing Room: west wall, duplicate entry_scheme catalogue
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