Palladian architecture - AbsoluteAstronomy.com

Palladian architecture is a Europe

Europe

Europe is, by convention, one of the world's seven continents. Comprising the westernmost peninsula of Eurasia, Europe is generally 'divided' from Asia to its east by the watershed divides of the Ural and Caucasus Mountains, the Ural River, the Caspian and Black Seas, and the waterways connecting...

an style of architecture

Architecture

Architecture is both the process and product of planning, designing and construction. Architectural works, in the material form of buildings, are often perceived as cultural and political symbols and as works of art...

derived from the designs of the Venetian

Republic of Venice

The Republic of Venice or Venetian Republic was a state originating from the city of Venice in Northeastern Italy. It existed for over a millennium, from the late 7th century until 1797. It was formally known as the Most Serene Republic of Venice and is often referred to as La Serenissima, in...

architect Andrea Palladio

Andrea Palladio

Andrea Palladio was an architect active in the Republic of Venice. Palladio, influenced by Roman and Greek architecture, primarily by Vitruvius, is widely considered the most influential individual in the history of Western architecture...

(1508–1580). The term "Palladian" normally refers to buildings in a style inspired by Palladio's own work; that which is recognised as Palladian architecture today is an evolution of Palladio's original concepts. Palladio's work was strongly based on the symmetry, perspective and values of the formal classical temple architecture of the Ancient Greek

Ancient Greek

Ancient Greek is the stage of the Greek language in the periods spanning the times c. 9th–6th centuries BC, , c. 5th–4th centuries BC , and the c. 3rd century BC – 6th century AD of ancient Greece and the ancient world; being predated in the 2nd millennium BC by Mycenaean Greek...

s and Romans

Ancient Rome

Ancient Rome was a thriving civilization that grew on the Italian Peninsula as early as the 8th century BC. Located along the Mediterranean Sea and centered on the city of Rome, it expanded to one of the largest empires in the ancient world....

. From the 17th century Palladio's interpretation of this classical architecture was adapted as the style known as Palladianism. It continued to develop until the end of the 18th century.

Palladianism became popular briefly in Britain

Early Modern Britain

Early modern Britain is the history of the island of Great Britain, roughly corresponding to the 16th, 17th, and 18th centuries. Major historical events in Early Modern British history include the English Renaissance, the English Reformation and Scottish Reformation, the English Civil War, the...

during the mid-17th century. In the early 18th century it returned to fashion, not only in England but also in many other European countries. Later when the style was falling from favour in Europe, it had a surge in popularity throughout the British colonies in North America, highlighted by examples such as Drayton Hall

Drayton Hall

Drayton Hall, in the South Carolina "Lowcountry" and about 15 miles northwest of Charleston, South Carolina and directly across the Ashley River from North Charleston, South Carolina, is one of the most handsome examples of Palladian architecture in North America.The house was built for John...

in South Carolina, the Redwood Library in Newport, Rhode Island, the Morris-Jumel Mansion in New York City and Thomas Jefferson

Thomas Jefferson

Thomas Jefferson was the principal author of the United States Declaration of Independence and the Statute of Virginia for Religious Freedom , the third President of the United States and founder of the University of Virginia...

's Monticello

Monticello

Monticello is a National Historic Landmark just outside Charlottesville, Virginia, United States. It was the estate of Thomas Jefferson, the principal author of the United States Declaration of Independence, third President of the United States, and founder of the University of Virginia; it is...

and Poplar Forest

Poplar Forest

Poplar Forest was Thomas Jefferson's plantation and plantation house in what is now Forest, Virginia, near Lynchburg. He designed it and treated it as a private retreat, working on it from 1806 until his death 20 years later. "It is the most valuable of my possessions," Jefferson once wrote a...

in Virginia.

The style continued to be popular in Europe throughout the 19th and early 20th centuries, where it was frequently employed in the design of public and municipal buildings. From the latter half of the 19th century it was rivalled by the Gothic revival, whose champions, such as Augustus Pugin, remembering the origins of Palladianism in ancient temples, deemed it too pagan for Protestant and Anglo-Catholic worship. However, as an architectural style it has continued to be popular and to evolve; its pediment

Pediment

A pediment is a classical architectural element consisting of the triangular section found above the horizontal structure , typically supported by columns. The gable end of the pediment is surrounded by the cornice moulding...

s, symmetry and proportions are clearly evident in the design of many modern buildings today.

Palladio's architecture

Buildings entirely designed by Palladio are all in Venice

Venice

Venice is a city in northern Italy which is renowned for the beauty of its setting, its architecture and its artworks. It is the capital of the Veneto region...

and the Veneto

Veneto

Veneto is one of the 20 regions of Italy. Its population is about 5 million, ranking 5th in Italy.Veneto had been for more than a millennium an independent state, the Republic of Venice, until it was eventually annexed by Italy in 1866 after brief Austrian and French rule...

, with an especially rich grouping of palazzi in Vicenza

Vicenza

Vicenza , a city in north-eastern Italy, is the capital of the eponymous province in the Veneto region, at the northern base of the Monte Berico, straddling the Bacchiglione...

, vaunted now in guidebooks as Palladio's City. They include villas

Palladian Villas of the Veneto

The City of Vicenza and the Palladian Villas of the Veneto is a World Heritage Site protecting a cluster of works by the architect Andrea Palladio. UNESCO inscribed the site on the World Heritage List in 1994. At first the site was called "Vicenza, City of Palladio" and only buildings in the...

, and churches such as Redentore

Il Redentore

The Chiesa del Santissimo Redentore , commonly known as ', is a 16th century Roman Catholic church located in the Dorsoduro sestiere of the Italian city of Venice. It was designed by the architect Andrea Palladio and built as a votive church to thank God for the deliverance of the city from a major...

in Venice. In Palladio's architectural treatise

Treatise

A treatise is a formal and systematic written discourse on some subject, generally longer and treating it in greater depth than an essay, and more concerned with investigating or exposing the principles of the subject.-Noteworthy treatises:...

s he followed the principles defined by the Roman

Roman Empire

The Roman Empire was the post-Republican period of the ancient Roman civilization, characterised by an autocratic form of government and large territorial holdings in Europe and around the Mediterranean....

architect Vitruvius

Vitruvius

Marcus Vitruvius Pollio was a Roman writer, architect and engineer, active in the 1st century BC. He is best known as the author of the multi-volume work De Architectura ....

and his 15th-century disciple Leon Battista Alberti, who adhered to principles of classical Roman architecture

Roman architecture

Ancient Roman architecture adopted certain aspects of Ancient Greek architecture, creating a new architectural style. The Romans were indebted to their Etruscan neighbors and forefathers who supplied them with a wealth of knowledge essential for future architectural solutions, such as hydraulics...

based on mathematical proportions rather than the rich ornamental style also characteristic of the Renaissance

Renaissance

The Renaissance was a cultural movement that spanned roughly the 14th to the 17th century, beginning in Italy in the Late Middle Ages and later spreading to the rest of Europe. The term is also used more loosely to refer to the historical era, but since the changes of the Renaissance were not...

.

Palladio always designed his villa

Villa

A villa was originally an ancient Roman upper-class country house. Since its origins in the Roman villa, the idea and function of a villa have evolved considerably. After the fall of the Roman Republic, villas became small farming compounds, which were increasingly fortified in Late Antiquity,...

s with reference to their setting. If on a hill, such as Villa Capra, facade

Facade

A facade or façade is generally one exterior side of a building, usually, but not always, the front. The word comes from the French language, literally meaning "frontage" or "face"....

s were frequently designed to be of equal value so that occupants could have fine views in all directions. Also, in such cases, portico

Portico

A portico is a porch leading to the entrance of a building, or extended as a colonnade, with a roof structure over a walkway, supported by columns or enclosed by walls...

s were built on all sides so that occupants could fully appreciate the countryside while being protected from the sun, similar to many American

United States

The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

-style porch

Porch

A porch is external to the walls of the main building proper, but may be enclosed by screen, latticework, broad windows, or other light frame walls extending from the main structure.There are various styles of porches, all of which depend on the architectural tradition of its location...

es of today. Palladio sometimes used a loggia

Loggia

Loggia is the name given to an architectural feature, originally of Minoan design. They are often a gallery or corridor at ground level, sometimes higher, on the facade of a building and open to the air on one side, where it is supported by columns or pierced openings in the wall...

as an alternative to the portico. This can most simply be described as a recessed portico, or an internal single storey room, with pierced walls that are open to the elements. Occasionally a loggia would be placed at second floor level over the top of a loggia below, creating what was known as a double loggia. Loggias were sometimes given significance in a facade by being surmounted by a pediment. Villa Godi has as its focal point a loggia rather than a portico, plus loggias terminating each end of the main building.

Palladio would often model his villa elevations on Roman temple

Roman temple

Ancient Roman temples are among the most visible archaeological remains of Roman culture, and are a significant source for Roman architecture. Their construction and maintenance was a major part of ancient Roman religion. The main room housed the cult image of the deity to whom the temple was...

facades. The temple influence, often in a cruciform

Cruciform

Cruciform means having the shape of a cross or Christian cross.- Cruciform architectural plan :This is a common description of Christian churches. In Early Christian, Byzantine and other Eastern Orthodox forms of church architecture this is more likely to mean a tetraconch plan, a Greek cross,...

design, later became a trademark

Trademark

A trademark, trade mark, or trade-mark is a distinctive sign or indicator used by an individual, business organization, or other legal entity to identify that the products or services to consumers with which the trademark appears originate from a unique source, and to distinguish its products or...

of his work. Palladian villas are usually built with three floors: a rusticated basement

Basement

__FORCETOC__A basement is one or more floors of a building that are either completely or partially below the ground floor. Basements are typically used as a utility space for a building where such items as the furnace, water heater, breaker panel or fuse box, car park, and air-conditioning system...

or ground floor, containing the service and minor rooms. Above this, the piano nobile

Piano nobile

The piano nobile is the principal floor of a large house, usually built in one of the styles of classical renaissance architecture...

accessed through a portico reached by a flight of external steps, containing the principal reception and bedrooms, and above it is a low mezzanine

Mezzanine (architecture)

In architecture, a mezzanine or entresol is an intermediate floor between main floors of a building, and therefore typically not counted among the overall floors of a building. Often, a mezzanine is low-ceilinged and projects in the form of a balcony. The term is also used for the lowest balcony in...

floor with secondary bedrooms and accommodation. The proportions of each room within the villa were calculated on simple mathematical ratios like 3:4 and 4:5, and the different rooms within the house were interrelated by these ratios. Earlier architects had used these formulas for balancing a single symmetrical facade; however, Palladio's designs related to the whole, usually square, villa.

Palladio deeply considered the dual purpose of his villas as both farmhouses and palatial weekend retreats for wealthy merchant

Merchant

A merchant is a businessperson who trades in commodities that were produced by others, in order to earn a profit.Merchants can be one of two types:# A wholesale merchant operates in the chain between producer and retail merchant...

owners. These symmetrical temple-like houses often have equally symmetrical, but low, wings sweeping away from them to accommodate horses, farm animals, and agricultural stores. The wings, sometimes detached and connected to the villa by colonnade

Colonnade

In classical architecture, a colonnade denotes a long sequence of columns joined by their entablature, often free-standing, or part of a building....

s, were designed not only to be functional but also to complement and accentuate the villa. They were, however, in no way intended to be part of the main house, and it is in the design and use of these wings that Palladio's followers in the 18th century adapted to become an integral part of the building.

The Palladian window

The Palladian, Serlian, or Venetian window features largely in Palladio's work, almost a trademark in his early career. It consists of a central light with semicircular arch over, carried on an impost consisting of a small entablature

Entablature

An entablature refers to the superstructure of moldings and bands which lie horizontally above columns, resting on their capitals. Entablatures are major elements of classical architecture, and are commonly divided into the architrave , the frieze ,...

, under which, and enclosing two other lights, one on each side, are pilasters. In the library at Venice, Sansovino

Jacopo Sansovino

Jacopo d'Antonio Sansovino was an Italian sculptor and architect, known best for his works around the Piazza San Marco in Venice. Andrea Palladio, in the Preface to his Quattro Libri was of the opinion that Sansovino's Biblioteca Marciana was the best building erected since Antiquity...

varied the design by substituting columns for the two inner pilasters. To describe its origin as being either Palladian or Venetian is not accurate; the motif was first used by Donato Bramante

Donato Bramante

Donato Bramante was an Italian architect, who introduced the Early Renaissance style to Milan and the High Renaissance style to Rome, where his most famous design was St...

(Ackerman) and later mentioned by Sebastiano Serlio

Sebastiano Serlio

Sebastiano Serlio was an Italian Mannerist architect, who was part of the Italian team building the Palace of Fontainebleau...

(1475–1554) in his seven-volume architectural book Tutte l'opere d'architettura et prospetiva

Tutte l'opere d'architettura et prospetiva

Tutte l'opere d'architettura et prospetiva is an architectural treatise by Italian Renaissance architect Sebastiano Serlio . Serlio is sometimes regarded as one of the most important...

expounding the ideals of Vitruvius and Roman architecture, this arched window is flanked by two lower rectangular openings, a motif that first appeared in the triumphal arch

Triumphal arch

A triumphal arch is a monumental structure in the shape of an archway with one or more arched passageways, often designed to span a road. In its simplest form a triumphal arch consists of two massive piers connected by an arch, crowned with a flat entablature or attic on which a statue might be...

es of ancient Rome. Palladio used the motif extensively, most notably in the arcades of the Basilica Palladiana

Basilica Palladiana

The Basilica Palladiana is a Renaissance building in the central Piazza dei Signori in Vicenza, north-eastern Italy. The most notable feature of the edifice is the loggia, which shows one of the first examples of the what came to be known as the Palladian window, designed by a young Andrea...

in Vicenza

Vicenza

Vicenza , a city in north-eastern Italy, is the capital of the eponymous province in the Veneto region, at the northern base of the Monte Berico, straddling the Bacchiglione...

. It is also a feature of his entrances to both Villa Godi

Villa Godi

Villa Godi is a patrician villa in Lugo di Vicenza, Veneto, northern Italy. It was one of the first projects by Andrea Palladio, as attested in his monograph I quattro libri dell'architettura...

and Villa Forni Cerato

Villa Forni Cerato

The Villa Forni Cerato is a 16th century villa in Montecchio Precalcino, Province of Vicenza, northern Italy. Its design is attributed to Andrea Palladio and his client is assumed to have been Girolamo Forni, a wealthy wood merchant who supplied building material for a number of the Palladio's...

. It is perhaps this extensive use of the motif in the Veneto

Veneto

that has given the window its alternative name of the Venetian window; it is also known as a Serlian window. Whatever the name or the origin, this form of window has probably become one of the most enduring features of Palladio's work seen in the later architectural styles evolved from Palladianism. According to James Lees-Milne

James Lees-Milne

James Lees-Milne was an English writer and expert on country houses. He was an architectural historian, novelist, and a biographer. He is also remembered as a diarist.-Biography:...

, its first appearance in Britain was in the remodeled wings of Burlington House

Burlington House

Burlington House is a building on Piccadilly in London. It was originally a private Palladian mansion, and was expanded in the mid 19th century after being purchased by the British government...

, London, where the immediate source was actually in Inigo Jones

Inigo Jones

Inigo Jones is the first significant British architect of the modern period, and the first to bring Italianate Renaissance architecture to England...

's designs for Whitehall Palace rather than drawn from Palladio himself.

Early Palladianism

In 1570 Palladio published his book, I Quattro Libri dell'Architettura

I Quattro Libri dell'Architettura

I quattro libri dell'architettura is an Italian treatise on architecture by the architect Andrea Palladio . It was first published in four volumes in 1570 in Venice, illustrated with woodcuts after the author's own drawings. It has been reprinted and translated many times...

, which inspired architects across Europe.

During the 17th century, many architects studying in Italy learned of Palladio's work. Foreign architects then returned home and adapted Palladio's style to suit various climate

Climate

Climate encompasses the statistics of temperature, humidity, atmospheric pressure, wind, rainfall, atmospheric particle count and other meteorological elemental measurements in a given region over long periods...

s, topographies

Topography

Topography is the study of Earth's surface shape and features or those ofplanets, moons, and asteroids...

and personal tastes of their clients. Isolated forms of Palladianism throughout the world were brought about in this way. However, the Palladian style did not reach the zenith of its popularity until the 18th century, primarily in England

England

England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...

, Wales

Wales

Wales is a country that is part of the United Kingdom and the island of Great Britain, bordered by England to its east and the Atlantic Ocean and Irish Sea to its west. It has a population of three million, and a total area of 20,779 km²...

, Scotland

Scotland

Scotland is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. Occupying the northern third of the island of Great Britain, it shares a border with England to the south and is bounded by the North Sea to the east, the Atlantic Ocean to the north and west, and the North Channel and Irish Sea to the...

, Ireland

Ireland

Ireland is an island to the northwest of continental Europe. It is the third-largest island in Europe and the twentieth-largest island on Earth...

and later North America

North America

North America is a continent wholly within the Northern Hemisphere and almost wholly within the Western Hemisphere. It is also considered a northern subcontinent of the Americas...

. In Venice itself there was an early reaction to the excesses of Baroque architecture that manifested itself as a return to Palladian principles. The earliest neo-Palladians there were the exact contemporaries, both trained up as masons, Domenico Rossi

Domenico Rossi

Domenico Rossi was an Italian architect.-References:...

(1657–1737) and Andrea Tirali

Andrea Tirali

Andrea Tirali was an Italian architect working in Venice and the Veneto. He is known to have worked at Villa Duodo and the Chiesa and Convento di San Nicolò at Tolentino, at Villa Duodo he added to the work of Vincenzo Scamozzi...

(1657–1737). Tommaso Temanza, their biographer, proved to be the movement's most able and learned proponent; in his hands the visual inheritance of Palladio's example became increasingly codified in correct rules and drifted towards neoclassicism

Neoclassical architecture

Neoclassical architecture was an architectural style produced by the neoclassical movement that began in the mid-18th century, manifested both in its details as a reaction against the Rococo style of naturalistic ornament, and in its architectural formulas as an outgrowth of some classicizing...

.

The most influential follower of Palladio anywhere, however, was the English Inigo Jones

Inigo Jones

Inigo Jones is the first significant British architect of the modern period, and the first to bring Italianate Renaissance architecture to England...

, who travelled throughout Italy with the 'Collector' Earl of Arundel, annotating his copy of Palladio's treatise, in 1613–14. The "Palladianism" of Jones and his contemporaries and later followers was a style largely of facades, and the mathematical formulae dictating layout were not strictly applied. A handful of great country houses in England built between 1640 and circa 1680, such as Wilton House

Wilton House

Wilton House is an English country house situated at Wilton near Salisbury in Wiltshire. It has been the country seat of the Earls of Pembroke for over 400 years....

, are in this Palladian style. These follow the great success of Jones' Palladian designs for the Queen's House

Queen's House

The Queen's House, Greenwich, is a former royal residence built between 1614-1617 in Greenwich, then a few miles downriver from London, and now a district of the city. Its architect was Inigo Jones, for whom it was a crucial early commission, for Anne of Denmark, the queen of King James I of England...

at Greenwich

Greenwich

Greenwich is a district of south London, England, located in the London Borough of Greenwich.Greenwich is best known for its maritime history and for giving its name to the Greenwich Meridian and Greenwich Mean Time...

and the Banqueting House

Banqueting House

In Tudor and Early Stuart English architecture a banqueting house is a separate building reached through pleasure gardens from the main residence, whose use is purely for entertaining. It may be raised for additional air or a vista, and it may be richly decorated, but it contains no bedrooms or...

at Whitehall

Whitehall

Whitehall is a road in Westminster, in London, England. It is the main artery running north from Parliament Square, towards Charing Cross at the southern end of Trafalgar Square...

, the uncompleted royal palace in London

London

London is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...

of King Charles I

Charles I of England

Charles I was King of England, King of Scotland, and King of Ireland from 27 March 1625 until his execution in 1649. Charles engaged in a struggle for power with the Parliament of England, attempting to obtain royal revenue whilst Parliament sought to curb his Royal prerogative which Charles...

.

However, the Palladian designs advocated by Inigo Jones were too closely associated with the court of Charles I to survive the turmoil of the civil war. Following the Stuart restoration Jones's Palladianism was eclipsed by the baroque

Baroque

The Baroque is a period and the style that used exaggerated motion and clear, easily interpreted detail to produce drama, tension, exuberance, and grandeur in sculpture, painting, literature, dance, and music...

designs of such architects as William Talman

William Talman (architect)

William Talman was an English architect and landscape designer. A pupil of Sir Christopher Wren, in 1678 he and Thomas Apprice gained the office of King's Waiter in the Port of London...

and Sir John Vanbrugh

John Vanbrugh

Sir John Vanbrugh – 26 March 1726) was an English architect and dramatist, perhaps best known as the designer of Blenheim Palace and Castle Howard. He wrote two argumentative and outspoken Restoration comedies, The Relapse and The Provoked Wife , which have become enduring stage favourites...

, Nicholas Hawksmoor

Nicholas Hawksmoor

Nicholas Hawksmoor was a British architect born in Nottinghamshire, probably in East Drayton.-Life:Hawksmoor was born in Nottinghamshire in 1661, into a yeoman farming family, almost certainly in East Drayton, Nottinghamshire. On his death he was to leave property at nearby Ragnall, Dunham and a...

, and even Jones' pupil John Webb.

English Palladian architecture

The baroque

Baroque

style, popular in continental Europe

Europe

, was never truly to the English taste. It was quickly superseded when, in the first quarter of the 18th century, four books were published in Britain which highlighted the simplicity and purity of classical architecture. These were:

Vitruvius Britannicus published by Colen Campbell
Colen Campbell
Colen Campbell was a pioneering Scottish architect who spent most of his career in England, and is credited as a founder of the Georgian style...

, 1715 (of which supplemental volumes appeared through the century)
Palladio's Four Books of Architecture translated by Giacomo Leoni
Giacomo Leoni
Giacomo Leoni , also known as James Leoni, was an Italian architect, born in Venice. He was a devotee of the work of Florentine Renaissance architect Leon Battista Alberti, who had also been an inspiration for Andrea Palladio. Leoni thus served as a prominent exponent of Palladianism in English...

, published from 1715 onwards.
Leone Battista Alberti
Leone Battista Alberti
Leon Battista Alberti was an Italian author, artist, architect, poet, priest, linguist, philosopher, cryptographer and general Renaissance humanist polymath...

's De Re Aedificatoria
De Re Aedificatoria
De re aedificatoria is a classic architectural treatise written by Leon Battista Alberti between 1443 and 1452. Although largely dependent on Vitruvius' De architectura, it was the first theoretical book on the subject written in the Italian Renaissance and in 1485 became the first printed book on...

, translated by Giacomo Leoni, published 1726.
The Designs of Inigo Jones... with Some Additional Designs, published by William Kent
William Kent
William Kent , born in Bridlington, Yorkshire, was an eminent English architect, landscape architect and furniture designer of the early 18th century.He was baptised as William Cant.-Education:...

, 2 vols., 1727 (A further volume, Some Designs of Mr. Inigo Jones and Mr. William Kent was published in 1744 by the architect John Vardy
John Vardy
John Vardy was an English architect attached to the Royal Office of Works from 1736. He was a close follower of the neo-Palladian architect William Kent....

, an associate of Kent.)

The most popular of these among the wealthy patrons of the day was the four-volume Vitruvius Britannicus by Colen Campbell. Campbell was both an architect and a publisher. The book was basically a book of design containing architectural prints of British buildings, which had been inspired by the great architects from Vitruvius

Vitruvius

Marcus Vitruvius Pollio was a Roman writer, architect and engineer, active in the 1st century BC. He is best known as the author of the multi-volume work De Architectura ....

to Palladio; at first mainly those of Inigo Jones, but the later tomes contained drawings and plans by Campbell and other 18th-century architects. These four books greatly contributed to Palladian architecture becoming established in 18th-century Britain. Their three authors became the most fashionable and sought after architects of the era. Due to his book Vitruvius Britannicus, Colen Campbell

Colen Campbell

Colen Campbell was a pioneering Scottish architect who spent most of his career in England, and is credited as a founder of the Georgian style...

was chosen as the architect for banker Henry Hoare I's Stourhead

Stourhead

Stourhead is a 2,650 acre estate at the source of the River Stour near Mere, Wiltshire, England. The estate includes a Palladian mansion, the village of Stourton, gardens, farmland, and woodland...

house (illustration below), a masterpiece that became the inspiration for dozens of similar houses across England.

At the forefront of the new school of design was the aristocratic "architect earl", Richard Boyle, 3rd Earl of Burlington

Richard Boyle, 3rd Earl of Burlington

Richard Boyle, 3rd Earl of Burlington and 4th Earl of Cork PC , born in Yorkshire, England, was the son of Charles Boyle, 2nd Earl of Burlington and 3rd Earl of Cork...

; In 1729, he and William Kent, designed Chiswick House

Chiswick House

Chiswick House is a Palladian villa in Burlington Lane, Chiswick, in the London Borough of Hounslow in England. Set in , the house was completed in 1729 during the reign of George II and designed by Lord Burlington. William Kent , who took a leading role in designing the gardens, created one of the...

. This House was a reinterpretation of Palladio's Villa Capra, but purified of 16th century elements and ornament. This severe lack of ornamentation was to be a feature of the Palladianism.
In 1734 William Kent

William Kent

William Kent , born in Bridlington, Yorkshire, was an eminent English architect, landscape architect and furniture designer of the early 18th century.He was baptised as William Cant.-Education:...

and Lord Burlington designed one of England's finest examples of Palladian architecture with Holkham Hall

Holkham Hall

Holkham Hall is an eighteenth-century country house located adjacent to the village of Holkham, on the north coast of the English county of Norfolk...

in Norfolk

Norfolk

Norfolk is a low-lying county in the East of England. It has borders with Lincolnshire to the west, Cambridgeshire to the west and southwest and Suffolk to the south. Its northern and eastern boundaries are the North Sea coast and to the north-west the county is bordered by The Wash. The county...

. The main block of this house followed Palladio's dictates quite closely, but Palladio's low, often detached, wings of farm buildings were elevated in significance. Kent attached them to the design, banished the farm animals, and elevated the wings to almost the same importance as the house itself. Often these wings were adorned with porticos and pediments, often resembling, as at the much later Kedleston Hall

Kedleston Hall

Kedleston Hall is an English country house in Kedleston, Derbyshire, approximately four miles north-west of Derby, and is the seat of the Curzon family whose name originates in Notre-Dame-de-Courson in Normandy...

, small country houses in their own right. It was the development of the flanking wings that was to cause English Palladianism to evolve from being a pastiche of Palladio's original work.

Architectural styles evolve and change to suit the requirements of each individual client. When in 1746 the Duke of Bedford

John Russell, 4th Duke of Bedford

John Russell, 4th Duke of Bedford KG, PC, FRS was an 18th century British statesman. He was the fourth son of Wriothesley Russell, 2nd Duke of Bedford, by his wife, Elizabeth, daughter and heiress of John Howland of Streatham, Surrey...

decided to rebuild Woburn Abbey

Woburn Abbey

Woburn Abbey , near Woburn, Bedfordshire, England, is a country house, the seat of the Duke of Bedford and the location of the Woburn Safari Park.- Pre-20th century :...

, he chose the Palladian style for the design, as this was now the most fashionable of the era. He selected architect Henry Flitcroft

Henry Flitcroft

Henry Flitcroft was a major English architect in the second generation of Palladianism. He came from a simple background: his father was a labourer in the gardens at Hampton Court and he began as a joiner by trade. Working as a carpenter at Burlington House, he fell from a scaffold and broke his leg...

, a protege of Burlington. Flitcroft's designs, while Palladian in nature, would not be recognised by Palladio himself. The central block is small, only three bays, the temple-like portico is merely suggested, and it is in fact closed. Two great flanking wings containing a vast suite of state room

State room

A state room in a large European mansion is usually one of a suite of very grand rooms which were designed to impress. The term was most widely used in the 17th and 18th centuries. They were the most lavishly decorated in the house and contained the finest works of art...

s replace the walls or colonnades which should have connected to the farm buildings; the farm buildings terminating the structure are elevated in height to match the central block, and given Palladian windows, to ensure they are seen as of Palladian design. This development of the style was to be repeated in countless houses, and town halls in Britain over one hundred years. Falling from favour during the Victorian era, it was revived by Sir Aston Webb

Aston Webb

Sir Aston Webb, RA, FRIBA was an English architect, active in the late 19th century and at the beginning of the 20th century...

for his refacing of Buckingham Palace

Buckingham Palace

Buckingham Palace, in London, is the principal residence and office of the British monarch. Located in the City of Westminster, the palace is a setting for state occasions and royal hospitality...

in 1913. Often the terminating blocks would have blind porticos and pilasters themselves, competing for attention with, or complementing the central block. This was all very far removed from the designs of Palladio two hundred years earlier.

English Palladian houses were now no longer the small but exquisite weekend retreats from which their Italian counterparts were conceived. They were no longer villa

Villa

s but "power houses" in Sir John Summerson

John Summerson

Sir John Newenham Summerson CH CBE was one of the leading British architectural historians of the 20th century....

's term, the symbolic centres of power of the Whig "squirearchy" that ruled Britain. As the Palladian style swept Britain, all thoughts of mathematical proportion were swept away. Rather than square houses with supporting wings, these buildings had the length of the facade as their major consideration; long houses often only one room deep were deliberately deceitful in giving a false impression of size.

Irish Palladianism

During the Palladian revival period in Ireland

Ireland

Ireland is an island to the northwest of continental Europe. It is the third-largest island in Europe and the twentieth-largest island on Earth...

, even quite modest mansions were cast in a neo-Palladian mould. Palladian architecture in Ireland subtly differs from that in England. While adhering as in other countries to the basic ideals of Palladio, it is often truer to them – perhaps because it was often designed by architects who had come directly from mainland Europe, and therefore were not influenced by the evolution that Palladianism was undergoing in Britain. Whatever the reason, Palladianism still had to be adapted for the wetter, colder weather.

One of the most pioneering Irish architects was Sir Edward Lovett Pearce

Edward Lovett Pearce

Sir Edward Lovett Pearce was an Irish architect, and the chief exponent of palladianism in Ireland. He is thought to have initially studied as an architect under his father's first cousin, Sir John Vanbrugh. He is best known for the Irish Houses of Parliament in Dublin, and his work on Castletown...

(1699–1733), who became one of the leading advocates of Palladianism in Ireland. A cousin of Sir John Vanbrugh

John Vanbrugh

, he was originally one of his pupils, but rejecting the baroque, he spent three years studying architecture in France

France

The French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...

and Italy, before returning home to Ireland. His most important Palladian work is the former Irish Houses of Parliament

Irish Houses of Parliament

The Irish Houses of Parliament , also known as the Irish Parliament House, today called the Bank of Ireland, College Green due to its use as by the bank, was the world's first purpose-built two-chamber parliament house...

in Dublin. He was a prolific architect who also designed the south facade of Drumcondra House

Drumcondra House

Drumcondra House in Drumcondra Dublin, is now part of All Hallows College. It was designed by the architect Sir Edward Lovett Pearce was built in 1726 for Sir Marmaduke Coghill who had lived in Belvedere House now part of St. Patrick's College of Education Drumcondra...

in 1727 and Cashel Palace in 1728.

One of the most notable examples of Palladianism in Ireland is the Castletown House

Castletown House

Castletown House, Celbridge, County Kildare, Ireland's is a Palladian country house built in 1722 for William Conolly, the Speaker of the Irish House of Commons. It formed the centrepiece of a estate...

, near Dublin. Designed by the Italian architect Alessandro Galilei (1691–1737), it is perhaps the only Palladian house in Ireland to have been built with Palladio's mathematical ratios, and one of the three Irish mansions which claim to have inspired the design of the White House

White House

The White House is the official residence and principal workplace of the president of the United States. Located at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue NW in Washington, D.C., the house was designed by Irish-born James Hoban, and built between 1792 and 1800 of white-painted Aquia sandstone in the Neoclassical...

in Washington

Washington, D.C.

Washington, D.C., formally the District of Columbia and commonly referred to as Washington, "the District", or simply D.C., is the capital of the United States. On July 16, 1790, the United States Congress approved the creation of a permanent national capital as permitted by the U.S. Constitution....

.

Other examples include Russborough, designed by Richard Cassels

Richard Cassels

Richard Cassels , who anglicised his name to Richard Castle, ranks with Edward Lovett Pearce as one of the greatest architects working in Ireland in the 18th century. Cassels was born in 1690 in Kassel, Germany. Although German, his family were of French origin, descended from the...

, an architect of German origin, who also designed the Palladian Rotunda Hospital in Dublin, and Florence Court

Florence Court

Florence Court is a large 18th century house and estate located 8 miles south-west of Enniskillen, County Fermanagh, Northern Ireland. It is set in the foothills of Cuilcagh Mountain. The nearby village is distinguished by the one-word name Florencecourt. It is owned and managed by the National...

, County Fermanagh

County Fermanagh

Fermanagh District Council is the only one of the 26 district councils in Northern Ireland that contains all of the county it is named after. The district council also contains a small section of County Tyrone in the Dromore and Kilskeery road areas....

. Irish Palladian Country houses often have robust Rococo

Rococo

Rococo , also referred to as "Late Baroque", is an 18th-century style which developed as Baroque artists gave up their symmetry and became increasingly ornate, florid, and playful...

plasterwork, frequently executed by the Lafranchini brothers

Lafranchini brothers

The Lafranchini brothers, originally from Switzerland, are famed today for their work in rococo style stucco, chiefly in the great palladian houses of Ireland....

, an Irish speciality, which is far more flamboyant than the interiors of their contemporaries in England. So much of Dublin was built in the 18th century that it set a Georgian

Georgian architecture

Georgian architecture is the name given in most English-speaking countries to the set of architectural styles current between 1720 and 1840. It is eponymous for the first four British monarchs of the House of Hanover—George I of Great Britain, George II of Great Britain, George III of the United...

stamp on the city; however arising out of bad planning and poverty, until recently Dublin was one of the few cities where fine 18th-century housing could be seen in ruinous condition. Elsewhere in Ireland after 1922, the lead was removed from the roofs of unoccupied Palladian houses for its value as scrap, with the houses often abandoned owing to excessive roof-rate based taxes. Some roofless Palladian houses can still be found in the depopulated Irish countryside.

North American Palladianism

Palladio's influence in North America is evident almost from the beginning of architect-designed building there though the Anglo-Irish philosopher, George Berkeley

George Berkeley

George Berkeley , also known as Bishop Berkeley , was an Irish philosopher whose primary achievement was the advancement of a theory he called "immaterialism"...

, may in fact have been America's pioneering Palladian. Acquiring a large farmhouse in Middletown, near Newport in the late 1720s, Berkeley dubbed it "Whitehall" and improved it with a Palladian doorcase derived from William Kent's Designs of Inigo Jones (1727), which he may have brought with him from London; Palladio's work was included in the library of a thousand volumes he amassed for the purpose and sent to Yale College

Yale College

Yale College was the official name of Yale University from 1718 to 1887. The name now refers to the undergraduate part of the university. Each undergraduate student is assigned to one of 12 residential colleges.-Residential colleges:...

. In 1749 Peter Harrison

Peter Harrison

Peter Harrison was a colonial American architect who was born in York, England and emigrated to Rhode Island in 1740. Peter Harrison and his brother, Joseph Harrison, came to the American colonies and established themselves as merchants and captains of their own "vessels." Peter Harrison returned...

adopted the design of his Redwood Library

Redwood Library and Athenaeum

The Redwood Library and Athenaeum is a private subscription library at 50 Bellevue Avenue, Newport, Rhode Island. Founded in 1747, it is the oldest community library still occupying its original building in the United States.-History:...

in Newport, Rhode Island

Newport, Rhode Island

Newport is a city on Aquidneck Island in Newport County, Rhode Island, United States, about south of Providence. Known as a New England summer resort and for the famous Newport Mansions, it is the home of Salve Regina University and Naval Station Newport which houses the United States Naval War...

, more directly from Palladio's Quattro Libri

I Quattro Libri dell'Architettura

, while his Brick Market, also in Newport, of a decade later is also Palladian in conception.

The Hammond-Harwood House

Hammond-Harwood House

The Hammond-Harwood House in Annapolis, Maryland, United States, is one of the premier colonial houses remaining in America from the British colonial period . It is the only existing work of colonial academic architecture that was principally designed from a plate in Andrea Palladio’s I Quattro...

in Annapolis, Maryland

Annapolis, Maryland

Annapolis is the capital of the U.S. state of Maryland, as well as the county seat of Anne Arundel County. It had a population of 38,394 at the 2010 census and is situated on the Chesapeake Bay at the mouth of the Severn River, south of Baltimore and about east of Washington, D.C. Annapolis is...

(illustration) is perhaps the finest example of Palladian architecture in the United States. It is the only existing work of colonial academic architecture that was principally designed from a plate in Andrea Palladio

Andrea Palladio

’s Quattro Libri.The house was designed by the architect William Buckland

William Buckland (Architect)

William Buckland was an architect who designed in colonial Maryland and Virginia.-Biography:Born at Oxford, England, Buckland spent seven years as an apprentice to his uncle, James Buckland, "Citizen and Joiner" of London. At 21, he was brought to Virginia as an indentured servant to Thomas Mason,...

in 1773–74 for wealthy farmer Matthias Hammond of Anne Arundel County, Maryland

Maryland

Maryland is a U.S. state located in the Mid Atlantic region of the United States, bordering Virginia, West Virginia, and the District of Columbia to its south and west; Pennsylvania to its north; and Delaware to its east...

. It was modeled on the design of the Villa Pisani

Villa Pisani (Montagnana)

The Villa Pisani is a patrician villa outside the city walls of Montagnana, Veneto, northern Italy.- Architectural details :It was designed by Andrea Palladio about 1552, for Cardinal Francesco Pisani...

in Montagnana

Montagnana

Montagnana is a town and comune in the province of Padova, in Veneto . It is bounded by other communes of Saletto, Megliadino San Fidenzio, Casale di Scodosia, Urbana, Bevilacqua, Pojana Maggiore and Noventa Vicentina...

, Italy

Italy

Italy , officially the Italian Republic languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Italy's official name is as follows:;;;;;;;;), is a unitary parliamentary republic in South-Central Europe. To the north it borders France, Switzerland, Austria and...

in Book II, Chapter XIV of I Quattro Libri dell’Achitettura.

The architect Thomas Jefferson

Thomas Jefferson

(1743–1826) once referred to Palladio's Quattro Libri as his bible

Bible

The Bible refers to any one of the collections of the primary religious texts of Judaism and Christianity. There is no common version of the Bible, as the individual books , their contents and their order vary among denominations...

. Jefferson acquired an intense appreciation of Palladio's architectural concepts, and his designs for his own beloved Monticello

Monticello

, the James Barbour

James Barbour

James Barbour was an American lawyer, amember and speaker of the Virginia House of Delegates, the 18th Governor of Virginia, the first Governor to reside in the current Virginia Governor's Mansion, a U.S. Senator from 1814–1825, and the United States Secretary of War from 1825-1828.Barbour was a...

Barboursville

Barboursville (James Barbour)

Barboursville is the ruin of the estate of former U.S. Senator, U.S. Secretary of War, and Virginia Governor James Barbour, located in Barboursville, Virginia, on the grounds of Barboursville Vineyards. The house was designed by Barbour's friend and political ally, Thomas Jefferson...

estate, and the University of Virginia

University of Virginia

The University of Virginia is a public research university located in Charlottesville, Virginia, United States, founded by Thomas Jefferson...

were based on drawings from Palladio's book. Realizing the powerful political significance pertaining to ancient Roman buildings, Jefferson designed his civic buildings in the Palladian style. Monticello (remodelled between 1796 and 1808) is quite clearly based on Palladio's Villa Capra, however, with modifications, in a style which is described in America today as Colonial Georgian. Jefferson's Pantheon

Pantheon, Rome

The Pantheon ,Rarely Pantheum. This appears in Pliny's Natural History in describing this edifice: Agrippae Pantheum decoravit Diogenes Atheniensis; in columnis templi eius Caryatides probantur inter pauca operum, sicut in fastigio posita signa, sed propter altitudinem loci minus celebrata.from ,...

, or Rotunda

The Rotunda (University of Virginia)

The Rotunda is a building located on The Lawn in the original grounds of the University of Virginia. It was designed by Thomas Jefferson to represent the "authority of nature and power of reason" and was inspired by the Pantheon in Rome. Construction began in 1822 and was completed in 1826, after...

, at the University of Virginia is undeniably Palladian in concept and style.

In Virginia

Virginia

The Commonwealth of Virginia , is a U.S. state on the Atlantic Coast of the Southern United States. Virginia is nicknamed the "Old Dominion" and sometimes the "Mother of Presidents" after the eight U.S. presidents born there...

and Carolina

The Carolinas

The Carolinas is a term used in the United States to refer collectively to the states of North and South Carolina. Together, the two states + have a population of 13,942,126. "Carolina" would be the fifth most populous state behind California, Texas, New York, and Florida...

, the Palladian manner is epitomised in numerous Tidewater

Tidewater region of Virginia

The Tidewater region of Virginia is the eastern portion of the Commonwealth of Virginia formally known as Hampton Roads. The term tidewater may be correctly applied to all portions of any area, including Virginia, where the water level is affected by the tides...

plantation

Plantation

A plantation is a long artificially established forest, farm or estate, where crops are grown for sale, often in distant markets rather than for local on-site consumption...

houses, such as Stratford Hall

Stratford Hall Plantation

Stratford Hall Plantation in Westmoreland County, Virginia, was the home of four generations of the Lee family of Virginia, including two signers of the Declaration of Independence, and it was the birthplace of Robert Edward Lee , who became the Confederate General-in-chief during the American...

or Westover Plantation

Westover Plantation

Westover Plantation is located on the north bank of the James River in Charles City County, Virginia. It is located south of State Route 5, a scenic byway which runs between the independent cities of Richmond and Williamsburg...

, or Drayton Hall

Drayton Hall

near Charleston

Charleston, South Carolina

Charleston is the second largest city in the U.S. state of South Carolina. It was made the county seat of Charleston County in 1901 when Charleston County was founded. The city's original name was Charles Towne in 1670, and it moved to its present location from a location on the west bank of the...

. These examples are all classic American colonial examples of a Palladian taste that was transmitted through engraving

Engraving

Engraving is the practice of incising a design on to a hard, usually flat surface, by cutting grooves into it. The result may be a decorated object in itself, as when silver, gold, steel, or glass are engraved, or may provide an intaglio printing plate, of copper or another metal, for printing...

s, for the benefit of masons—and patrons, too—who had no first-hand experience of European building practice. A feature of American Palladianism was the re-emergence of the great portico, which again, as in Italy, fulfilled the need of protection from the sun; the portico in various forms and size became a dominant feature of American colonial architecture. In the north European countries the portico had become a mere symbol, often closed, or merely hinted at in the design by pilaster

Pilaster

A pilaster is a slightly-projecting column built into or applied to the face of a wall. Most commonly flattened or rectangular in form, pilasters can also take a half-round form or the shape of any type of column, including tortile....

s, and sometimes in very late examples of English Palladianism adapted to become a porte-cochere

Porte-cochere

A porte-cochère is the architectural term for a porch- or portico-like structure at a main or secondary entrance to a building through which a horse and carriage can pass in order for the occupants to alight under cover, protected from the weather.The porte-cochère was a feature of many late 18th...

; in America, the Palladian portico regained its full glory.

One house which clearly shows this Palladian-Gibbs influence is Mount Airy

Mount Airy, Richmond County, Virginia

Mount Airy, near Warsaw in Richmond County, Virginia, built in 1758-62, is a mid-Georgian plantation house, the first built in the manner of a neo-Palladian villa. It was constructed for Colonel John Tayloe II, perhaps the richest Virginia planter of his generation...

, in Richmond County, Virginia

Richmond County, Virginia

Richmond County is a county located on the Northern Neck in the Commonwealth of Virginia, a state in the United States. As of 2010, the population was 9,254. Its county seat is Warsaw. The rural county should not be confused with the large city and state capital Richmond, Virginia, which is over...

, built in 1758–62.

At Westover

Westover Plantation

the north and south entrances, made of imported Portland stone

Portland stone

Portland stone is a limestone from the Tithonian stage of the Jurassic period quarried on the Isle of Portland, Dorset. The quarries consist of beds of white-grey limestone separated by chert beds. It has been used extensively as a building stone throughout the British Isles, notably in major...

, were patterned after a plate in William Salmon's Palladio Londinensis (1734)."

The distinctive feature of Drayton Hall

Drayton Hall

, its two-storey portico, was derived directly from Palladio.

Thomas Jefferson must have gained particular pleasure as the second occupant of the White House

White House

in Washington, which was doubtless inspired by Irish Palladianism. Both Castle Coole and Richard Cassel's Leinster House

Leinster House

Leinster House is the name of the building housing the Oireachtas, the national parliament of Ireland.Leinster House was originally the ducal palace of the Dukes of Leinster. Since 1922, it is a complex of buildings, of which the former ducal palace is the core, which house Oireachtas Éireann, its...

in Dublin claim to have inspired the architect James Hoban

James Hoban

James Hoban was an Irish architect, best known for designing The White House in Washington, D.C.-Life:James Hoban was born and raised in a thatched cottage on the Earl of Desart's estate in Cuffesgrange, near Callan in Co. Kilkenny...

, who designed the executive mansion, built between 1792 and 1800. Hoban, born in Callan, County Kilkenny

County Kilkenny

County Kilkenny is a county in Ireland. It is part of the South-East Region and is also located in the province of Leinster. It is named after the city of Kilkenny. The territory of the county was the core part of the ancient Irish Kingdom of Osraige which in turn was the core of the Diocese of...

, in 1762, studied architecture in Dublin, where Leinster House (built circa 1747) was one of the finest buildings at the time. The Palladianism of the White House is interesting as it is almost an early form of neoclassicism, especially the South facade, which closely resembles James Wyatt

James Wyatt

James Wyatt RA , was an English architect, a rival of Robert Adam in the neoclassical style, who far outdid Adam in his work in the neo-Gothic style.-Early classical career:...

's design for Castle Coole

Castle Coole

Castle Coole is a townland and a late-18th-century neo-classical mansion situated in Enniskillen, County Fermanagh, Northern Ireland.Set in a 1200 acre wooded estate, it is one of three properties owned and managed by the National Trust in County Fermanagh, the others being Florence Court and the...

of 1790, also in Ireland. Ironically, the North facade lacks one of the floors from Leinster House, while the Southern facade is given one floor more than Castle Coole, and has an external staircase more in the Palladian manner. Castle Coole is, in the words of the architectural commentator Gervase Jackson-Stops, "A culmination of the Palladian traditions, yet strictly neoclassical in its chaste ornament and noble austerity." The same can be said of many houses in the American Palladian style.

One of the adaptations made to Palladianism in America was that the piano nobile now tended to be placed on the ground floor, rather than above a service floor, as was the tradition in Europe. This service floor, if it existed at all, was now a discreet semi-basement. This negated the need for an ornate external staircase leading to the main entrance as in the more original Palladian designs. This would also be a feature of the neoclassical style that followed Palladianism.

The only two houses in the United States—from the English colonial period (1607–1776)—that can be definitively attributed to designs from the Four Books of Architecture are architect William Buckland's Hammond-Harwood House

Hammond-Harwood House

(1774) in Annapolis, Maryland

Annapolis, Maryland

, and Thomas Jefferson's first Monticello. The design source for the Hammond-Harwood House is Villa Pisani at Montagnana

Montagnana

(Book II, Chapter XIV), and for the first Monticello (1770) the design source is Villa Cornaro

Villa Cornaro

Villa Cornaro is a patrician villa in Piombino Dese, about 30 km northwest of Venice, Italy. It was designed by the Italian Renaissance architect Andrea Palladio in 1552 and is illustrated and described by him in Book Two of his 1570 masterwork, I Quattro Libri dell'Architettura [The Four...

at Piombino Dese

Piombino Dese

Piombino Dese is a comune in the Province of Padua in the Italian region Veneto, located about 35 km northwest of Venice and about 20 km north of Padua...

(Book II, Chapter XIV). Thomas Jefferson later covered this facade with later additions so that the Hammond-Harwood House remains the only pure and pristine example of direct modeling in America today.

Because of its later development, Palladian architecture in Canada is rare. One notable example is the Nova Scotia Legislature building

Province House (Nova Scotia)

Province House is where the Nova Scotia Legislature, known officially as the Nova Scotia House of Assembly, has met every year since 1819. The building is Canada's oldest house of government...

, completed in 1819.

The Center for Palladian Studies in America, Inc.

The Center for Palladian Studies in America, Inc.

The Center for Palladian Studies in America, Inc. engages in research and other activities relating to the work of architect Andrea Palladio. CPSA was founded as a national non-profit membership corporation in Charlottesville, Virginia, in 1979 and is presently headquartered in Richmond, Virginia...

, a non-profit membership organization, was founded in 1979 to research and promote understanding of Palladio’s influence in the United States.

Decline of Palladianism

By the 1770s, in Britain, such architects as Robert Adam

Robert Adam

Robert Adam was a Scottish neoclassical architect, interior designer and furniture designer. He was the son of William Adam , Scotland's foremost architect of the time, and trained under him...

and Sir William Chambers

William Chambers (architect)

Sir William Chambers was a Scottish architect, born in Gothenburg, Sweden, where his father was a merchant. Between 1740 and 1749 he was employed by the Swedish East India Company making several voyages to China where he studied Chinese architecture and decoration.Returning to Europe, he studied...

were in huge popular demand, but they were now drawing on a great variety of classical sources, including ancient Greece

Greece

Greece , officially the Hellenic Republic , and historically Hellas or the Republic of Greece in English, is a country in southeastern Europe....

, so much so that their forms of architecture were eventually defined as neoclassical

Neoclassicism

Neoclassicism is the name given to Western movements in the decorative and visual arts, literature, theatre, music, and architecture that draw inspiration from the "classical" art and culture of Ancient Greece or Ancient Rome...

rather than Palladian. In Europe, the Palladian revival ended by the end of the 18th century. In North America, Palladianism lingered a little longer; Thomas Jefferson's floor plans and elevations owe a great deal to Palladio's Quattro Libri. The term "Palladian" today is often misused, and tends to describe a building with any classical pretensions. There was, however, a revival of Palladian ideas amounst the colonial revivalist of the early 20th century, and the strain has been unbroken, even through the modernist period. Today there is a small but thriving school of practicing classical architects, bringing Palladio's ideas to the new century.

External links

The source of this article is wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. The text of this article is licensed under the GFDL.

Palladio's architecture

The Palladian window

Early Palladianism

English Palladian architecture

Irish Palladianism

North American Palladianism

Decline of Palladianism

See also

External links