Royal Favouritism in London Building
London must be transformed into a place 'safe from fire and beautiful and magnificent' decreed James I – and Patrick Youngblood finds it was only the wealthy who were to be entrusted with the privilege of building such a city.
The restrictions imposed on building in early seventeenth-century London were basically egalitarian in tone, but in execution these restrictions were often bent shamelessly in favour of the upper classes. From the Crown's point of view, the relative merits of a proposed building scheme were often less important than the background or wealth of its author. Likewise, the circumstances surrounding a violation of the building code were in many cases secondary to the status of the offender. Building was, in essence, a privileged activity, and, although periodic attempts were made to rectify the problem, favouritism largely determined the course of London's development from the early part of the century up to the Civil War.
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