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‘London the Ring, Covent Garden the Jewell of that Ring’: New Light on Covent Garden

‘London the Ring, Covent Garden the Jewell of that Ring’: New Light on Covent Garden It has long been accepted that St Paul’s Church, Covent Garden, and the porticoed houses along the north and east sides of the Piazza, were built to the designs of Inigo Jones in the early years of the 1630s, although this has been based on little concrete evidence. There are no surviving drawings for the project, for example, and there is no mention of the architect in the surviving building accounts for the church or the houses. Jones does, however, mention Covent Garden in a note he made later in his copy of Barbaro’s Vitruvius, and attribution has been confirmed through contemporary allusions to Jones’s authorship, and John Webb’s biographical notes. Jones was the King’s Surveyor of Works, also, and the executive officer of the Commission on Buildings, initially formed in 1618, and as such appointed to implement Charles’s building proclamation of 1625. The licence granted to Francis Russell, fourth Earl of Bedford, in February 1630/31 to develop Covent Garden reflected accurately the mandate of the commission text, and so the King’s Surveyor, obviously, would have exercised control over such an extensive project. As well, Jones’s design of St Paul’s Church, its flanking gates and houses, and the arcaded buildings of the Piazza, have been aptly described as ‘a comprehensive essay in the Tuscan mood, all the way from the high sophistication of the [church] portico to the vernacular of the houses’, and as such can be seen as a continuation of his ‘Tuscan mode’ following on from the Park Gate at St James’s Palace in 1627, and the Sculpture Gallery in 1629–30. http://www.deepdyve.com/assets/images/DeepDyve-Logo-lg.png Architectural History Cambridge University Press

‘London the Ring, Covent Garden the Jewell of that Ring’: New Light on Covent Garden

Architectural History , Volume 43: 22 – Apr 11, 2016
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Publisher
Cambridge University Press
Copyright
Copyright © Society of Architectural Historians of Great Britain 2000
ISSN
2059-5670
eISSN
0066-622X
DOI
10.2307/1568690
Publisher site
See Article on Publisher Site

Abstract

It has long been accepted that St Paul’s Church, Covent Garden, and the porticoed houses along the north and east sides of the Piazza, were built to the designs of Inigo Jones in the early years of the 1630s, although this has been based on little concrete evidence. There are no surviving drawings for the project, for example, and there is no mention of the architect in the surviving building accounts for the church or the houses. Jones does, however, mention Covent Garden in a note he made later in his copy of Barbaro’s Vitruvius, and attribution has been confirmed through contemporary allusions to Jones’s authorship, and John Webb’s biographical notes. Jones was the King’s Surveyor of Works, also, and the executive officer of the Commission on Buildings, initially formed in 1618, and as such appointed to implement Charles’s building proclamation of 1625. The licence granted to Francis Russell, fourth Earl of Bedford, in February 1630/31 to develop Covent Garden reflected accurately the mandate of the commission text, and so the King’s Surveyor, obviously, would have exercised control over such an extensive project. As well, Jones’s design of St Paul’s Church, its flanking gates and houses, and the arcaded buildings of the Piazza, have been aptly described as ‘a comprehensive essay in the Tuscan mood, all the way from the high sophistication of the [church] portico to the vernacular of the houses’, and as such can be seen as a continuation of his ‘Tuscan mode’ following on from the Park Gate at St James’s Palace in 1627, and the Sculpture Gallery in 1629–30.

Journal

Architectural History – Cambridge University Press

Published: Apr 11, 2016

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