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Legal Quays and Custom House, south of Lower Thames Street, City of London, 1796
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Reference number
SM D3/11/5
Purpose
Legal Quays and Custom House, south of Lower Thames Street, City of London, 1796
Aspect
[4] Elevation and also showing A the Monument, tower of B St Dunstans in the East and C London Bridge
Scale
to a scale
Inscribed
as above, Sketch of a Design for the improvement of the Legal Quays between London Bridge & The Tower and dimensions given
Signed: Geo: Dance Architect
Dated: 1796
Signed and dated
- 1796
Medium and dimensions
Pen, sepia, raw umber, burnt umber and green earth washes, watercolour technique, shaded within triple ruled border on wove paper laid down on card (220 x 1055 on 265 x 1100)
Hand
Dance
Notes
Drawn by Dance in a finished manner with staffage including two sailing barges and a rowing boat, the drawing was engraved: see Engraved plans referred to in the Second and Third Reports of the Parliamentary Select Committee upon the Improvement of the Port of London, published 1799 and 1800. Plate XVIII.
The length of the building is 1516 feet 6 inches and it is supported on 67 arches. The final design is more highly modelled than in the preliminary designs with the arched podium broken forward to provide loading ramps that are also a setting for statues representing Europe, Asia, Africa and America. The crowning features are Britannia with shield and spear and, above the balustrade in the centre and at each end, twin S-scrolls with a scallop shell in the centre, a decorative motif that Soane was later to use in the attic of the Bank of England; there is a specimen on the north wall of the Monument Court, at the Soane Museum. Though the five-storey warehouses are present in all of the designs catalogued above, in this design their fronts are recessed as well as advanced and the water-gates are emphasised by mouldings so at to articulate the long front. The four or five windows in each bay are divided only by sills and share the same arched head, here semicircular and in [SM D3/11/4], segmental. The 67 semicircular-headed arches of the podium are raised on taller piers in this final design and the shallow-hipped roof of [SM D3/11/4] is suppressed behind a parapet.
See also a record drawing of St Dunstan-in-the-East showing the height of each stage made in connection with the design of the Legal Quays.
The length of the building is 1516 feet 6 inches and it is supported on 67 arches. The final design is more highly modelled than in the preliminary designs with the arched podium broken forward to provide loading ramps that are also a setting for statues representing Europe, Asia, Africa and America. The crowning features are Britannia with shield and spear and, above the balustrade in the centre and at each end, twin S-scrolls with a scallop shell in the centre, a decorative motif that Soane was later to use in the attic of the Bank of England; there is a specimen on the north wall of the Monument Court, at the Soane Museum. Though the five-storey warehouses are present in all of the designs catalogued above, in this design their fronts are recessed as well as advanced and the water-gates are emphasised by mouldings so at to articulate the long front. The four or five windows in each bay are divided only by sills and share the same arched head, here semicircular and in [SM D3/11/4], segmental. The 67 semicircular-headed arches of the podium are raised on taller piers in this final design and the shallow-hipped roof of [SM D3/11/4] is suppressed behind a parapet.
See also a record drawing of St Dunstan-in-the-East showing the height of each stage made in connection with the design of the Legal Quays.
Level
Drawing
If you have any further information about this object, please contact us: drawings@soane.org.uk