Main entry:

Francis, Raymond.

Title & Author:

Looking for Georgian England / Raymond Francis

Publication:

London, Macdonald [1952]

Description:

243 pages illustrations 23 cm

Notes:
Includes bibliographical references.
[Table of Contents] -- Preface -- Introduction -- 1. Farnham -- 2. Chichester -- 3. Brighton and Other South Coast Resorts -- 4. Bath and Bristol -- 5. Cheltenham -- 6. 4t Blandford -- 7. Winchester -- 8. South London -- 9. Hampstead -- 10. Twickenham -- 11. Dedham and Mistley -- 12. Huntingdon -- 13. York -- 14. Newcastle-On-Tyne -- 15. Georgian Country Houses -- 16. The Georgian Inn -- 17. Public Buildings -- 18. Homes of Famous Men and Women -- 19. The Storied Urn -- Select Bibliography -- Index.

Summary:

"To make anything approaching a comprehensive survey of our Georgian heritage would necessitate a book at least ten times the length of the present volume. All that is attempted here is to offer a brief introduction to a fascinating subject, in the hope that it will add to the enjoyment both of visitors from overseas, who have come to England for the first time, and of those who spend their holidays at home. As it is intended for beginners, the use of technical terms has been confined to the minimum. It is hoped that the illustrations will speak for themselves and, by training the readers' eye, enable him to identify a good Georgian building when he comes across one. My task has been to help him appreciate what he sees, particularly the smaller, less obtrusive kind of Georgian homes which are to be found in practically all our towns and villages. The problem of selection has been difficult, but the rule followed, except in a few cases such as Bath, Brighton and York, has been to omit places and individual buildings which are on every tourist's itinerary and about which information is easily obtainable in guide-books and descriptive volumes. Thus I have said little about the Georgian architecture of central London and nothing at all about the important Georgian buildings in the University cities of Oxford and Cambridge. Similarly, among the great Georgian country houses which may now be visited by the public, I have purposely passed over such world-famous mansions as Chatsworth, Lyme Park, with its impressive Palladian south front, erected in 1726 by the Venetian architect Giacomo Leoni, Kedleston, the joint creation of James Paine and Robert Adam, Syon House, Islesworth, the seat of the Duke of Northumberland, for which Robert Adam designed a sequence of splendid state rooms culminating in the long gallery, Holkham, William Kent's Palladian masterpiece, Wolterton Hall, near Norwich Blenheim Palace, Harewood House, near Leeds, the home of the Princess Royal and the Earl of Harewood, and several others of almost equal importance. With some reluctance, for the subject is tempting, I have refrained from overloading the book with an account of the achievements of the late Georgian engineers, such as James Brindley, Telford, Macadam and Sir Isambard Brunel, in building canals, bridges, harbours and tunnels and improving the surface of the roads. A long and melancholy chapter could have been written about the stately homes which have either fallen into decay or been demolished by the house-breakers, owing to the inability of their heavily-taxed owners to keep them in repair. This was ruled out, however, as the book's primary object is to interest the reader not in what has gone but in the wealth of beauty which still remains. If the writer's personal choice of what to describe, and what to leave the reader to discover for himself, may seem somewhat arbitrary to the expert, the reason is that he has been guided less by the wish to indicate what towns or buildings are regarded as of outstanding architectural importance than by a desire to call attention to those which are most characteristic of the Georgian period. For the benefit of readers who wish to make a more detailed study of Georgian buildings and their architects a list of books has been appended at the end of this volume which will help them to do so." -- Preface

Subject:

Architecture, Domestic England.
Architecture, Domestic
Architecture, Georgian
Architecture Great Britain
England
England Description and travel

Holdings:

Location: Library main 12397
Call No.: ID:87-B1453
Status: Available