[214] Record drawing of the apartments in the north wing of the Light Horse Court, 30 September 1816

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Sir John Soane office drawings: the drawings of Sir John Soane and the office of Sir John Soane
- Public buildings
  - London: Royal Hospital, Chelsea for the Board of Commissioners, 1807-1835 (226)
    - Surveys, alterations and repairs to Wren's Chapel, the north wing of the Light Horse Court and the Octagon porch portico, December 1817 - April 1835 (12)

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Reference number

SM 66/5/2

Purpose

[214] Record drawing of the apartments in the north wing of the Light Horse Court, 30 September 1816

Aspect

First floor Plan of the Principal Floor of Secretary Comptroller and Stewards Apartments, Chelsea Hospital as existing and omitting the First Chaplain's apartments

Scale

bar scale

Inscribed

as above, labelled Secretary (three times), Comptroller (eight times), Steward (six times) and Part of the East Court

Signed and dated

30^th September 1816

Hand

Soane office

Notes

Soane's repairs to Wren's buildings extended to both the north and south wings of the Light Horse Court. Although there are no surviving designs for the south wing, various alterations and repairs are recorded for the north wing, made as the needs of the occupants changed.

C.G.T. Dean wrote that 'The building on the northern side of Light Horse Court was designed for the "Officers of the House", or senior officials. It consisted of three tenements, each comprising eight rooms. The house nearest the main building was shared by the Steward and Comptroller; that in the middle by the Secretary & Register, his clerk and the Wardrobe Keeper; and that nearest the East Road were occupied by the Sexton.... Some rooms in this block were subsequently redecorated by Robert Adam or John Soane, but others retained their original panelling'. The Chaplain, as can be seen from SM 66/5/6, was housed in the main building, between the Chapel and the east wing. SM 66/5/6 does not show the part of the building nearest the East Road.

This drawing and SM 66/5/6 probably correspond to the Board of Commissioner's minute notes for a meeting on 4 October 1816: 'Mr Soane attended with Plans for the alteration of the Secretary, the Comptroller and Stewards Apartments', which are all labelled on this drawing and SM 66/5/6. SM 66/5/6 shows a plan of the room arrangements before Soane's alterations very similar to that shown in this drawing. Below this is a design for Soane's intended alterations.

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).