[79] Design for the later south-east Transfer Office lantern, 1820

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Sir John Soane office drawings: the drawings of Sir John Soane and the office of Sir John Soane
- Bank of England
  - Bank of England, City of London for the Governor and Company of the Bank of England, 1788-1834 (1356)
    - 1817-1833 Rebuilding of offices in the south-east and the façade, temporary office spaces and presentation drawings (221)
      - South and south-east Transfer Offices, 1817-23 (115)

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Reference number

SM volume 74/118

Purpose

[79] Design for the later south-east Transfer Office lantern, 1820

Aspect

Longitudinal section showing the roof, lantern and ground floor

Scale

bar scale

Inscribed

The Bank of England, 3 per Cent Reduced Office, Height of the figure Base / & the Cap[ital] 6 feet 6 / without the Cap[ital] 5.10

Signed and dated

1820

Hand

Soane office

Notes

This drawing, SM volume 74/115 and SM volume 73/116 show a very similar longitudinal section of the later south-east Transfer Office to that shown in SM volume 74/117 and SM volume 74/121. However, unlike SM volume 74/117 and SM volume 74/121, this series of drawings all show an additional roof-ornament and the section is cut across a point further to the centre of the hall. As a result, the column arrangement encircling the first tier of the inner lantern can be seen. The columns themselves appear almost astylar, though as built the lantern would include fluted Ionic columns.

This drawing and SM volume 74/115 have inscriptions that refer to the later south Transfer Office lantern: SM volume 74/115 bears a feint pencil inscription labelling the 'Cornice of the Rotunda' above the section and the inscription on this drawing refers to the 'Height of the figur[e] Base'. Both inscriptions indicate that the drawings may be preliminary designs for the later south Transfer Office lantern - the Rotunda would be located as labelled on SM volume 74/115, to the north of the office, and caryatid figures were used in place of columns. However, pre-demolition photographs and the early design-presentation drawing SM volume 71/50, show that the later south Transfer Office lantern was constructed of two tiers and paired figures, not one tier with sixteen single columns as these drawings show. It is more likely that the design for the later south Transfer Office lantern was reused and written over for the preliminary designs for the later south Transfer Office lantern (which was probably constructed later than the former).

Level

Drawing

Digitisation of the Drawings Collection has been made possible through the generosity of the Leon Levy Foundation

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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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