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Inigo Jones and the Hatfield Riding House

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  11 April 2016

Giles Worsley
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Extract

Among Inigo Jones’s earliest surviving drawings is one that is generally described as being an elevation for a stable (Fig. 1). This pen and ink drawing, executed in a loose, curvaceous hand, shows a tall, rusticated archway, flanked at an upper level by a pair of windows. Above is a low pediment, with a cartouche and flanking figures, supporting three elegant statues. On either side of this central range are lower, single-storey balustraded bays, each with a large window. Beyond these are lower, lean-to ranges, with a single door flanked by a pair of small, circular windows.

The design is not entirely happy and reveals Inigo Jones’s immaturity as an architect. The windows flanking the arch are cramped. The clash between the size of the quoins on the central block and those on the flanking bays is uncomfortable. The sudden jump of scale from the three central elements to the lean-tos is not convincing. The line of the lean-to roofs cuts uncomfortably close to the architraves of the doors. Nevertheless, as one of Jones’s first designs for a freestanding building the design is of great interest.

Type
Research Article
Information
Architectural History , Volume 45 , 2002 , pp. 230 - 237
Copyright
Copyright © Society of Architectural Historians of Great Britain 2002

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References

Notes

1 Harris, John and Higgott, Gordon, Inigo Jones: Complete Architectural Drawings (London, 1989), pp. 48–49.Google Scholar

2 Harris, and Higgott, , Inigo Jones, pp. 180-81.Google Scholar

3 In the seventeenth century it was common for stalls dividing stables to have a short full-height section at the horse’s head, with the horses separated from each other by hanging planks or bales. This arrangement can still be seen in the mid-seventeenth-century stables at Dunster Castle, Somerset.

4 Girouard, Mark (ed.), ‘The Smythson Collection of the Royal Institute of British Architects’, Architectural History, 5 (1962), pp. 21–184 Google Scholar (pp. 134–35, 154, figs III (5–6), III/2).

5 Girouard, , ‘The Smythson Collection’, p. 67 Google Scholar, I/4; Harris, John, The Artist and the Country House (London, 1979), p.84 Google Scholar, fig. 84.

6 For a full account of the history of haute école in Britain see Worsley, Giles, ‘The Design and Development of the Stable and Riding House in the British Isles from the thirteenth century to 1914’, doctoral thesis, London University, Courtauld Institute, 1989.Google Scholar

7 Colvin, Howard (ed.), A History of the King’s Works, 6 Vols (London, 1982), iv, p. 163.Google Scholar

8 Colvin, , King’s Works, iv, pp. 244–45Google Scholar; Girouard, , ‘The Smythson Collection’, p. 76 Google Scholar, fig. I/14.

9 Landesbibliothek Kassel, MS Hass. 18, fol. 79v; Public Record Office, E317 Surrey 46.

10 Colvin, , King’s Works, iv, pp. 162–64.Google Scholar

11 PRO, E351/3251; Colvin, , King’s Works, iv, p. 177.Google Scholar

12 Hammond, Lieutenant, ‘Relation of a short survey of the Western Counties’, Camden Miscellany, xvi, Camden 3rd Series, lii (1936), pp. 1–128 (p. 37)Google Scholar; Batho, G. R. (ed.), ‘The Percies at Petworth’, Sussex Archaeological Collections, 95 (1957), pp. 1–27 (pp. 18–19)Google Scholar; Petworth Archives, 1630, pp. 30,31; Alnwick Castle, Syon MS U 13,4.

13 Girouard, , ‘The Smythson Collection’, pp. 76, 153 Google Scholar, figs I/14; HI/15 (3)-See also, Lucy Worsley and Tom Addyman, ‘Riding Houses and Horses: William Cavendish’s Architecture for the Art of Horsemanship’, elsewhere in this volume of Architectural History.

14 Huntingdon Library, San Marino, California, Bridgwater MSS 8117.

15 The riding house is not shown in 1652 Plan de Gomboust but appears in De La Grive's Plan of Paris of 1728.

16 Brownlee, David B., Karl Weinbrenner: Architect of Karlsruhe. A Catalogue of the Drawings in the Architectural Archives of the University of Pennsylvania (Philadelphia, 1986), pp. 99–100 Google Scholar, figs 57–58.

17 Sir John Soane's Museum, 21/116; 38/50–4; Edgar, William, The Plan of the City and Castle of Edinburgh (Edinburgh, 1765)Google Scholar; Bolton, Arthur, The Architecture of Robert and James Adam, 2 vols (London, 1922), i, pp. 63–64.Google Scholar

18 The word ‘drawinge’ here is probably used as a verb, not as a noun.

19 S.P. Dom. James I, 57/82; Hatfield Papers Accounts 160/1. I am grateful to Mr Robin Harcourt Williams for confirming these references.

20 Chaney, Edward, review of Fusco, A. C., ‘Inigo Jones: Vitruvius Britannicus', Burlington Magazine, cxxx (August 1988), 1025, pp. 633–34Google Scholar; Chaney, Edward, The Evolution of the Grand Tour (London, 1998), pp. 173,196 Google Scholar, n. 24.

21 Stoye, J. W., English Travellers Abroad (London, 1952) p. 59 Google Scholar; Hatfield Papers, SFP, I, 70,123.

22 Sixth Report of the Historical Manuscripts Commission (London, 1877), p. 230.Google Scholar

23 Cavendish, Margaret, The Life of… William Cavendish, Duke, Marquess and Earl of Newcastle (London, 1667), p. 142.Google Scholar

24 Hatfield Papers, SFP, I, 69; Stoye, , English Travellers, p. 124.Google Scholar

25 I owe this information to Paula Henderson.

26 Liedtke, Walter, The Royal Horse (New York, 1989), p. 92.Google Scholar

27 Boudon, François and Blécon, Jean, Le chateau de Fontainebleau de François Ier to Henri IV (Paris, 1998)Google Scholar, fig. 19.

28 Dan, Pierre, Le tresor des merveilles de la maison royale de Fontainebleau (Paris, 1642), p. 29.Google Scholar

29 Hillairet, Jacques, Le Palais de Tuilleries (Paris, 1965), p. 20 Google Scholar, fig. 16; Sauval, Henri, Histoires et recherches des antiquités de la ville de Paris, three vols (Paris, 1724), II, p. 59.Google Scholar

30 Sauval, , Ville de Paris, ii, pp. 41, 498 Google Scholar; Hillairet, , Tuilleries, p. 24 Google Scholar; de Pluvinel, Antoine, Maneige Royale (Paris, 1623).Google Scholar

31 Harris, John, ‘Inigo Jones and the Princes’ Lodging at Newmarket', Architectural History, 2 (1959), pp. 26–40 (p. 34)CrossRefGoogle Scholar; PRO, E351/3251; Colvin, , King's Works, iv, p. 177 Google Scholar. Higgott, and Harris, (in Inigo Jones, p. 180)Google Scholar suggest that the stables in this design are placed under sloping roofs to allow extra loft space for the storage of fodder. The roof spaces are too low for the storage of fodder. This must have been kept elsewhere.

32 Alnwick Castle, Syon MS U 13, 4.

33 The early history of Syon House is obscure and little remains of the seventeenth-century improvements. The ninth Earl (who was imprisoned in the Tower of London) is known to have spent £9,000 on the house and grounds by 1613, and the tenth Earl (formerly Lord Percy), carried out extensive work in 1634–37 and 1657–62. Cherry, Bridget and Pevsner, Nikolaus in The Buildings of England, London 3. North West (Harmondsworth, 1991), p. 444)Google Scholar assume that the arcaded loggia dates from the time of the tenth Earl, who succeeded in 1632 and died in 1668, but Jeremy Wood does not refer to it (or to a riding house) in his study of the tenth Earl's building work (Wood, Jeremy, “The Architectural Patronage of Algernon Percy, 10th Earl of Northumberland', in English Architecture Public and Private, ed. Bold, John and Downes, Kerry (London, 1993), pp. 74–80).Google Scholar