DOI Seite / Zitierlink:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.33484#0015
INTRODUCTION
SIR CHRISTOPHER WREN'S ORIGINAL DESIGN FOR
HAMPTON COURT PALACE IN 1689
ART from the reference to Hampton Court Palace in (see A,
page 19), very little appears to be known on the subject of Sir Christopher
Wren's real intentions and first design (of 1689) for the new Palace. The
drawings illustrated here have been drawn out from four original pencil sketches,
half elevations, on which are certain further indications in the form of notes
(Plates nos. 11,12). These, with the aid of an original small-scale block plan drawn
in ink (Plate no. 4), have proved suhicient to enable the general plan of the hrst
intended Palace to be recovered with a considerable degree of certainty. The
existing Palace gives, no doubt in a reduced form, some general idea of the
nature of the accommodation for the King and Queen that had to be provided,
and the missing details of the original plan have been hlled in accordingly.
The story begins with the landingof William on November 5, 1688, and the
settlement by Parliament on January 22, 1689. FoIIowing on this, in April of
that year, work began in the form of adapting the old Tudor Palace for lodgings
for the King and Queen and the Royal Household. MuIIioned windows were
replaced by sashes, Tudor hreplaces built up, dado and other panellings and
partitions, etc., inserted—William's Dutch friends having very dehnite ideas on
modernism. The old idea that these are the earliest sash windows in England
seems to be correct, in so far that it is the hrst extensive and complete instance
of their adoption. It is stated that Wren's Palace at Winchester for Charles II
(1683) had the older English type of window as hrst built.
In laying out his plan for Hampton Court Palace, Wren had two dominant
axial lines, those of the Canal and of the intended Bushy Park Avenue. Their
crossing gives a hxed position with which the old Hall, if preserved, must be
reconciled. It has been necessary therefore, on the data of his sketch elevations,
to allow for a possible discrepancy of about nine feet. Had the scheme proceeded,
this point would easily have been adjusted in the working-out of the drawings.
There is nothing to show whether the exterior of the Hall was to be re-faced or
to remain as the Tudor builders had left it. The plan seems to imply a new
vestibule, or entrance hall, on the farther side. It seems probable that the floor
of the old Hall would give the general level of the hrst Hoor of the new Palace,
but there is no trace of any study of the levels, or other details of the scheme.
Wren's sketches for the new Palace must have been made in great haste,
because it is clear that materials were being collected in June and foundations
dug in July. In lact the hrst measurement of executed masonry at the existing
building is rendered in October. Work proceeded steadily until the crisis
preceding the Battle of the Boyne, July 1, 1690, after which political decision,
B
SIR CHRISTOPHER WREN'S ORIGINAL DESIGN FOR
HAMPTON COURT PALACE IN 1689
ART from the reference to Hampton Court Palace in (see A,
page 19), very little appears to be known on the subject of Sir Christopher
Wren's real intentions and first design (of 1689) for the new Palace. The
drawings illustrated here have been drawn out from four original pencil sketches,
half elevations, on which are certain further indications in the form of notes
(Plates nos. 11,12). These, with the aid of an original small-scale block plan drawn
in ink (Plate no. 4), have proved suhicient to enable the general plan of the hrst
intended Palace to be recovered with a considerable degree of certainty. The
existing Palace gives, no doubt in a reduced form, some general idea of the
nature of the accommodation for the King and Queen that had to be provided,
and the missing details of the original plan have been hlled in accordingly.
The story begins with the landingof William on November 5, 1688, and the
settlement by Parliament on January 22, 1689. FoIIowing on this, in April of
that year, work began in the form of adapting the old Tudor Palace for lodgings
for the King and Queen and the Royal Household. MuIIioned windows were
replaced by sashes, Tudor hreplaces built up, dado and other panellings and
partitions, etc., inserted—William's Dutch friends having very dehnite ideas on
modernism. The old idea that these are the earliest sash windows in England
seems to be correct, in so far that it is the hrst extensive and complete instance
of their adoption. It is stated that Wren's Palace at Winchester for Charles II
(1683) had the older English type of window as hrst built.
In laying out his plan for Hampton Court Palace, Wren had two dominant
axial lines, those of the Canal and of the intended Bushy Park Avenue. Their
crossing gives a hxed position with which the old Hall, if preserved, must be
reconciled. It has been necessary therefore, on the data of his sketch elevations,
to allow for a possible discrepancy of about nine feet. Had the scheme proceeded,
this point would easily have been adjusted in the working-out of the drawings.
There is nothing to show whether the exterior of the Hall was to be re-faced or
to remain as the Tudor builders had left it. The plan seems to imply a new
vestibule, or entrance hall, on the farther side. It seems probable that the floor
of the old Hall would give the general level of the hrst Hoor of the new Palace,
but there is no trace of any study of the levels, or other details of the scheme.
Wren's sketches for the new Palace must have been made in great haste,
because it is clear that materials were being collected in June and foundations
dug in July. In lact the hrst measurement of executed masonry at the existing
building is rendered in October. Work proceeded steadily until the crisis
preceding the Battle of the Boyne, July 1, 1690, after which political decision,
B