Читать книгу The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction. Volume 10, No. 264, July 14, 1827 - Various - Страница 1

NEW CHURCH, REGENT'S PARK

The architectural splendour which has lately developed itself in and about the precincts of the parish of St. Mary-le-Bonne, exhibits a most surprising and curious contrast with the former state of this part of London; and more particularly when compared with accounts extracted from newspapers of an early date.

Mary-le-Bonne parish is estimated to contain more than ten thousand houses, and one hundred thousand inhabitants. In the plans of London, in 1707, it was a small village one mile distant from the Metropolis, separated by fields—the scenes of robbery and murder. The following from a newspaper of 1716:—"On Wednesday last, four gentlemen were robbed and stripped in the fields between Mary-le-Bonne and London." The "Weekly Medley," of 1718, says, "Round about the New Square which is building near Tyburn road, there are so many other edifices, that a whole magnificent city seems to be risen out of the ground in a way which makes one wonder how it should find a new set of inhabitants. It is said it is to be called by the name of Hanover Square! On the other side is to be built another square, called Oxford Square." From the same article I have also extracted the dates of many of the different erections, which may prove of benefit to your architectural readers, as tending to show the progressive improvement made in the private buildings of London, and showing also the style of building adopted at later periods. Indeed, I would wish that some of your correspondents—F.R.Y., or P.T.W., for instance, would favour us with a list of dates answering this purpose. Rathbone-place and John-street (from Captain Rathbone) began 1729. Oxford market opened 1732. Newman-street and Berners-street, named from the builders, between 1723 and 1775. Portland-place and street, 1770. Portman-square, 1764. Portman-place, 1770. Stratford-place, five years later, on the site of Conduit Mead, built by Robert Stratford, Esq. This had been the place whereon stood the banquetting house for the lord mayor and aldermen, when they visited the neighbouring nine conduits which then supplied the city with water. Cumberland-place, 1769. Manchester-square the year after.

Previous to entering upon an architectural description of the superb buildings recently erected in the vicinity of Regency Park, I shall confine myself at present to that object that first arrests the attention at the entrance, which is the church; it has been erected under the commissioners for building new churches. The architect is J. Soane, Esq. There is a pleasing originality in this gentleman's productions; the result of extensive research among the architectural beauties of the ancients, together with a peculiar happy mode of distributing his lights and shadows; producing in the greatest degree picturesque effect: these are peculiarities essentially his own, and forming in no part a copy of the works of any other architect in the present day. The church in question by no means detracts from his merit in these particulars. The principal front consists of a portico of four columns of the Ionic order, approached by a small flight of steps; on each side is a long window, divided into two heights by a stone transum (panelled). Under the lower window is a raised panel also; and in the flank of the building the plinth is furnished with openings; each of the windows is filled with ornamental iron-work, for the purpose of ventilating the vaults or catacombs. The flank of the church has a central projection, occupied by antae, and six insulated Ionic columns; the windows in the inter-columns are in the same style as those in front; the whole is surmounted by a balustrade. The tower is in two heights; the lower part has eight columns of the Corinthian order. Example taken from the temple of Vesta, at Tivoli; these columns, with their stylobatæ and entablature, project, and give a very extraordinary relief in the perspective view of the building. The upper part consists of a circular peristyle of six columns; the example apparently taken from the portico of the octagon tower of Andronicus Cyrrhestes, or tower of the winds, from the summit of which rises a conical dome, surmounted by the Vane. The more minute detail may be seen by the annexed drawing. The prevailing ornament is the Grecian fret.

Mr. Soane, during his long practice in the profession, has erected very few churches, and it appears that he is endeavouring to rectify failings that seem insurmountable in the present style of architecture,—that of preventing the tower from having the appearance of rising out of the roof, by designing his porticos without pediments; if this is the case, he certainly is indebted to a great share of praise, as a pediment will always conceal (particularly at a near view) the major part of a tower. But again, we find ourselves in another difficulty, and it makes the remedy as bad as the disease,—that of taking away the principal characteristic of a portico, (namely, the pediment), and destroying at once the august appearance which it gives to the building; we find in all the churches of Sir Christopher Wren the campanile to form a distinct projection from the ground upwards; thus assimilating nearer to the ancient form of building them entirely apart from the main body of the church. I should conceive, that if this idea was followed by introducing the beautiful detail of Grecian architecture, according to Wren's models it would raise our church architecture to a very superior pitch of excellence.

In my next I shall notice the interior, and also the elevation towards the altar.

C. DAVY.

Furnivals' Inn,

July 1, 1827.