After Robert Adam's original design for a library at Lansdowne House of about 1764 (SM, Adam vol.39,61); published in The Works in architecture of Robert and James Adam, II, 1779, part III, plate I) the scheme that next followed, in 1772, was that by Panini, a painter of landscapes and architecture, draughtsman, and the son of the more famous Giovanni Paolo Panini. Drawn to the specification of Gavin Hamilton, the scheme accorded with the painter/archaeologist/dealer's idea of a gallery at Lansdowne House that would be a 'receptacle of fine antique statues ... famous not only in England but all over Europe' and that also had a 'small room where it was proposed to paint the story of Paris and Helen' (quoted by Stillman, 1970, p.77). A year earlier, Lord Shelbourne (later Lansdowne) had been in Italy, and while in Rome, had contracted with Hamilton for the supply of 16 Antique statues, 12 Antique busts, 12 Antique bas-reliefs as well as 11 large historical pictures and four landscapes to be painted by Hamilton himself.

Panini's design does not have the tripartite arrangement of other schemes, the gallery occupying the main body and one end room of Adam's library; the other end room was to be painted with 'the story of Paris and Helen'. The source for the design was the Baroque format of the Farnese Gallery though 'lighter, less robust, and less vital' (Stillman 1970, p.77). By 1773, Lord Lansdowne had reverted to the idea of using the room as a library and the design by Panini was shelved for one by C.-L. Clérisseau.

LITERATURE. D. Stillman, 'The Gallery for Lansdowne House', Art Bulletin, LII, 1970, pp.75-80, reproduced fig.4: E. Bénézit, Dictionnaire des peintres, sculpteurs, dessinateurs et graveurs, 1976, vol. VIII, p.107; J. Ingamells, ed., A Dictionary of British and Irish travellers in Italy, 1701-1800, 1997, p.852.