Unfinished design for the elevation of a large building with a towered and domed centre block. This is flanked by obelisks. There is a pavilion of four stories, connected by a pyramid form. All are decorated with rich sculptural decoration.

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Robert and James Adam travel drawings
- Adam Volume 10

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Reference number

Adam vol.10/18

Purpose

Unfinished design for the elevation of a large building with a towered and domed centre block. This is flanked by obelisks. There is a pavilion of four stories, connected by a pyramid form. All are decorated with rich sculptural decoration.

Aspect

Elevationverso plans

Signed and dated

Undated but datable to 1756 or 7

Medium and dimensions

Pencil and pen312 x 425

Hand

Robert Adam

Verso

Unfinished architectural plans in pencil for two courtyard buildings with corner pavilions.

Watermark

Mongolfier

Notes

In the opinion of A. A. Tait, this drawing relates in time and place or subject to those contained in Adam volume 55.In Adam volume 10, drawings 1-23 are in a section separated from the rest by blank pages, noted in pencil 'There follow 6 blank pages'. Virtually all the drawings in this section are schemes in plan and elevation for a Parliament building modelled, probably by Robert Adam, on James Adam's scheme of 1762/3. The plan in Adam vol.10/1, its elevation in 10/20 and the unfinished project here in 10/18 were all doubtless seen by the compiler of the volume as relevant to the understanding of the Parliament drawings. It is worth noting that like volume 55, this volume was intended to contain a collection very different from these sketch plans and elevations. The flyleaf is noted in ink and in an eighteenth-century hand, subsequently scored out, 'The Contents/Shields/Quivers/Other warlike Instruments/Instruments of Sacrifice/ Musical Instruments/Ensigns of Deitys/Lamps.This drawing is related to one of the wings of Robert Adam's vast design of 1757 for a palace (see Adam vol.28/1). It presents a striking contrast with the large but conservative Adam schemes for a Parliament House, for which there are several plans in volume 7. It can also be related to the large pencil sketch on the verso of Adam vol.10/14 and to Adam vol.21/40. The two plans on the verso may be connected with Adam's courtyard schemes in Adam vol.54 and to Adam vol.21/40 and 79.

Literature

D. Stillman, 'Robert Adam's Grand Tour', Antiques, vol.83, June 1963, p.672; A. A. Tait, Robert Adam, The Creative Mind from the sketch to the finished drawing, catalogue of an exhibition at Sir John Soane's Museum, London, London, 1996, p.14.

Level

Drawing

Exhibition history

Robert Adam, The Creative Mind: from the Sketch to the Finished Drawing, Sir John Soane's Museum, 4 October 1996 - 1 March 1997; The Frick Collection, New York, December 1997 - April 1998; Hammer Museum, Los Angeles, May - June 1998; The Octagon Museum, Washington, July 1998 - January 1999; Scottish National Gallery, Edinburgh, February - March 1999

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).