[96-100] Variant presentation designs, three labelled 'A', for elevations to the River Thames (5)

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Sir John Soane office drawings: the drawings of Sir John Soane and the office of Sir John Soane
- Office of Works
  - London: Palace of Westminster: designs for alterations and additions, 1793-1828 (499)
    - London: House of Lords, Palace of Westminster: official (mostly domeless) designs, July 1794 - February 1795 (134)

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Reference number

SM (96) 16/6/9 (97) 16/6/10 (98) 16/6/11 (99) 16/6/12 (100) P273 North Drawing Room

Purpose

[96-100] Variant presentation designs, three labelled 'A', for elevations to the River Thames (5)

Aspect

96 Elevation with pediment 97 Elevation with stepped pedestal, ouroboros and seated statue 98 Elevation with balustrade to roof 99 Elevation with stepped pedestal, ouroboros and statue of Boudica with quadriga 100 Elevation with pediment and seated statue

Scale

(96-98) to a scale of 1/4 inch to 1 foot (99) bar scale of 1/4 inch to 1 foot (100) to a scale

Inscribed

(96-98) Design A (97-98) verso: Design A / Elevation to the River (96-99) titled: The Elevation to the River of a Design to render the House of Lords and the Rooms and Offices appertaining thereto more commodious (100) titled: Part of the Elevation to the River of a Design to render the House of Lords / and the Rooms and Offices thereto pertaining more commodious

Signed and dated

(96) John Soane Arch^t1794

Medium and dimensions

(96-98) Pen, raw umber, light blue, sepia and black washes, shaded with multiple-ruled and sepia and black wash border on laid paper (630 x 978, 628 x 980, 606 x 957) (99) pen, raw umber, sepia and black washes, shaded with multiple-ruled and sepia and black wash border on wove paper (661 x 1195) (100) pen, sepia, warm sepia, blue washes, shaded, with quadruple-ruled and sepia wash border at top and bottom on ? laid paper (625 x 848) framed

Hand

(96-100) Frederick Meyer (1775-?, pupil April 1791-1796)

Watermark

(96-98) J Whatman

Notes

The designs are seven bays wide, with a three-storey, five-bay centre and two-storey single bay wings except for drawing 98 which has nine bays with a seven-bay centre. The rusticated ground floor has a door with fluted jambs and, on either side, two square windows with matching jambs. The wings have each a single tall window and a balustrade. The five-bay centre is articulated by six Ionic columns, four to the recessed centre and one at each end. A Greek fret moulding runs the width of the building. Drawings 96-98 have PRO REGE LEGE GREGE inscribed on the frieze ("For the King, the Law and the People").

The main point of difference between these five designs is the skyline. Drawing 96 has a pediment and the door is flanked by trophies while drawing 97 has a parapet with two panels behind which is a large cicrular pedestal with an ouroboros that supports a seated figure of Britannia with a lion on each side. Drawing 98 has a balustrade above the cornice. Drawing 99 is a variant of drawing 97 with a larger ouroboros and a sculpted Boudica with quadriga and the front door flanked by trophies.

Drawing 100 was probably made after drawings 96-99 for exhibition at the Royal Academy, perhaps in 1801 as 'Part of the design for the new House of Lords'. It is close in design to drawing 96 but has the added embellishments of a pair of roundels with carved figures (Sol and Luna from Arch of Constantine) set in a square panel that replace the end windows of the upper storey, the first floor is rusticated, the first floor windows of the wings have each a cornice, and the apex of the pediment is crowned by a seated figureof Britannia flanked by lions (seen also on drawing 97).

A comparison of elevations with plans suggests that (plans) 32 to 35 which show a seven-bay front with six (1 4 1) columns may be related to the elevations catalogued here.

Drawing 99 re-appears in Soane's Architectural Visions of Early Fancy..., a composite perspective of Soane's unbuilt works placed in a dramatic landscape drawn by J.M.Gandy and exhibited at the Royal Academy in 1820 (SM P81).

S. Sawyer, 'Soane in Westminster', PhD thesis, Columbia University, 1999, p. 196, drawings 96-100.

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).