Architecture

Tudor Edwards introduces the Second-Empire architect who was at once a fanatical restorer in the Gothic style and a daring speculator in new architectural thought.

Esther Moir brings us on a visit to the Nonconformist chapels of England, products of a long tradition in vernacular architecture, and well adapted to the needs of local worshippers.

Martin Biddle visits Nonsuch, a magnificent combination of French Renaissance decoration, with English late Gothic design, built by Henry VIII in a spirit of rivalry with Francis I of France.

Though he was a less inspired architect than Wren or Vanbrugh, writes Tudor Edwards, Hawksmoor’s life and work are inextricably interwoven with theirs and he contributed largely to their great achievement.

Founded by the Macedonian conqueror from whom it took its name, Alexandria became a stronghold of literature and learning, the splendid focus of the Hellenistic world. By E. Badian.

Completed in 1209, finally demolished in 1832, this famous construction was for more than five hundred years—until the opening of a new bridge at Westminster in 1750—London’s only thoroughfare across the Thames. By R.B. Oram.

Today a ‘beautiful but broken shell’, the Parthenon has housed three very different cults – those of Athena, Allah and the Blessed Virgin – since it was first constructed in the fifth century BC. It was a Christian soldier, in the siege of 1687, who did most to destroy the sanctuary. 

Evelyn Hardy visits an English architectural monument of elaborate richness.

G.R. Batho

Fischer von Erlach flourished in a new era of exhibitionism, Mary Henderson writes, to become the most influential Austrian architect of the Baroque period, shaping the tastes of the Habsburg empire.