St Veronica's and The White Visitation

[Mark Wright AIA]

Howdy
> Date: Fri, 23 Dec 2005 07:26:05 +1100
> From: jbor at bigpond.com
> Subject: Re: St Veronica's and The White Visitation

> Some thoughts: There are different "Wings" in TWV, and usually four 
> wings to a Palladian house. 

Two wings, typically. A very few of the very grandest were planned with
four, which seldom got built before the family ran out of money.
Nostell Priory, Holkham and Kedleston were planned with four, but these
stretch sideways to fill a 1:2 rectangle with wide fronts for a grand
effect, the paired wings on either side forming courtyards close to the
house to conceal unsightly stable/estate and kitchen/laundry mess.
Often of even the largest houses, however, such as Wanstead, Wentworth
Woodhouse and Prior Park, and Walpole's fantastic Houghton Hall, were
planned with two wings forming arms stretching as far as possible out
to either side (this made the houses look as big as possible from their
axial approaches) or reaching out in front to form a grand formal
courtyard. Many great houses continued the older tradition that
disposed irregular ranges of building around less-formally composed
protected courtyards, each added element built by its masons in the
fashion of the day without much regard for continuity. The Caroline
house Wilton is a fine example of how fruitful this approach could be,
and since its classical bits were thought to be by Inigo Jones it
served as a respected model right up into the 20th century. TWV may
have a "Palladian" element in this manner, but I think P thought
"Palladian" was a synonym for "Georgian", which is a period rather than
a style.

The four wings of a Palladian house's 
> ground plan within a circular estate form a mandala (like the
> Swastika, 
> for example). 

Circular estate? Mandalla? Where do you get this s*** Rob? You're just
making it up as you go along and it isn't helpful. Are you this bad on
other topics as well?

The last part of the description in that section (p.
> 83, 
> from the dash) is quite beautiful.

Yes it is, and if you were to read it and *look* at the English
Palladian houses you *must* see, surely, that what P describes so
vividly is not the careful display of fastidious, rule-bound taste that
was the Palladian movement in England, but rather a were-building,
expressing the derangement and wickedness of the men (mostly) within
it.

I'm done with y'all on this subject.
Happy Holidays,
Mark



	
		
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