William Kent

William Kent (born in Bridlington, Yorkshire, c. Bridlington is a town and Civil parish in the East Riding of Yorkshire, England. Yorkshire is a historic county of Northern England and the largest in Great Britain. 1685 – 12 April 1748) was an eminent English architect, landscape architect and furniture designer of the early 18th century. Events 467 - Anthemius is elevated to Emperor of the Western Roman Empire. Year 1748 ( MDCCXLVIII) was a Leap year starting on Monday (link will display the full calendar of the Gregorian calendar (or a England is a Country which is part of the United Kingdom. Its inhabitants account for more than 83% of the total UK population whilst its mainland An architect is a licensed individual who leads a design team in the Planning and Design of buildings and participates in oversight of Building Construction A landscape architect is a person involved in the planning design and sometimes oversight of an exterior landscape or space Furniture is the Mass noun for the movable objects which may support the human body (seating furniture and beds, provide storage or hold objects on horizontal

Education

Kent's career began as a sign and coach painter who was encouraged to study art, design and architecture by his employer. A group of Yorkshire gentlemen sent Kent for a period of study in Rome, where he met Thomas Coke, later 1st Earl of Leicester, with whom he toured Northern Italy in the summer of 1714 (a tour that led Kent to an appreciation of the architectural style of Andrea Palladio's palaces in Vicenza), and Richard Boyle, 3rd Earl of Burlington, who took him back to England in 1719. Rome ( Roma ˈroma Roma is the capital city of Italy and Lazio, and is Italy's largest and most populous city with more than 2 Thomas Coke 1st Earl of Leicester may refer to Thomas Coke 1st Earl of Leicester (fifth creation (1697&ndash1759 Thomas Coke 1st Earl Andrea Palladio ( November 30, 1508 – August 19, 1580) was an Italian Architect, widely considered the most influential Vicenza, a city in northern Italy, is the capital of the eponymous province in the Veneto region at the northern base of the Monte Berico Richard Boyle 3rd Earl of Burlington and 4th Earl of Cork PC ( April 25, 1694 &ndash December 15, 1753) born in Yorkshire As a painter, he displaced Sir James Thornhill in decorating the new state rooms at Kensington Palace, London; for Burlington, he decorated Chiswick House and Burlington House. See also English school of painting Sir James Thornhill ( 25 July 1675 or 1676 – May 4, 1734) was an English Kensington Palace is a royal residence set in Kensington Gardens in the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea in London, England Chiswick House is a neo- Palladian Villa in Burlington Lane Chiswick, in the London Borough of Hounslow. For the New York City skycraper see Burlington House (New York City Burlington House is a building on Piccadilly in London

Architectural works

He is better remembered as the central architect of the revived Palladian style in England. PLEASE DO NOT ADD AN INFO BOX TO THIS PAGE --> Palladian architecture is a European style of Architecture derived from the designs of the Italian Burlington gave him the task of editing The Designs of Inigo Jones. Iñigo Jones ( July 15, 1573 &ndash June 21, 1652) is regarded as the first significant British architect, and the first to bring . . with some additional designs in the Palladian/Jonesian taste by Burlington and Kent, which appeared in 1727. As he rose through the royal architectural establishment, the Board of Works, Kent applied this style to several public buildings in London, for which Burlington's patronage secured him the commissions: the Royal Mews at Charing Cross (1731–33, demolished in 1830), the Treasury buildings in Whitehall (1733–37), the Horse Guards building in Whitehall, (designed shortly before his death and built 1750–1759). London ( ˈlʌndən is the capital and largest urban area in the United Kingdom. The Royal Mews is the Mews ( Stables and in recent times also the garage) of the British Royal Family in London. Charing Cross is located at the junction of the Strand, Whitehall and Cockspur Street in Central London, England. Whitehall is a road in Westminster in London, England. It is the main artery running north from Parliament Square, towards traditional Horse Guards is a large Grade I listed building in the Palladian style between Whitehall and Horse Guards Parade in London, England These neo-antique buildings were inspired as much by the architecture of Raphael and Giulio Romano as by Palladio. Raphael Sanzio, usually known by his first name alone (in Italian Raffaello) (April 6 or March 28 1483 – April 6 1520 was an Italian painter and Giulio Romano (c 1499 &ndash November 1, 1546) was an Italian painter and architect.

In country house building, major commissions for Kent were designing the interiors of Houghton Hall (c. Houghton Hall is a Country house in Norfolk, England. It was built for the de facto first British Prime Minister, Sir Robert 1725–35), recently built by Colen Campbell for Sir Robert Walpole, but at Holkham Hall the most complete embodiment of Palladian ideals is still to be found; there Kent collaborated with Thomas Coke, the other "architect earl", and had for an assistant Matthew Brettingham, whose own architecture would carry Palladian ideals into the next generation. Colen Campbell (1676–1729 was a pioneering Scottish architect who spent most of his career in England, and is credited as a founder of the Georgian style Robert Walpole 1st Earl of Orford, KG, KB, PC (26 August 1676 &ndash 18 March 1745 known before 1742 as Sir Robert Walpole, was a 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 A theatrically Baroque staircase and parade rooms in London, at 44 Berkeley Square, are also notable. This article refers to a town square in London For other meanings of Berkeley or Berkeley Square see Berkeley. Kent's domed pavilions were erected at Badminton House and at Euston Hall. Badminton House is a large Country house in Gloucestershire, England, and has been the principal seat of the Dukes of Beaufort since the late Euston Hall is a Country house, with park by William Kent and Capability Brown, outside Bury St Edmunds, Suffolk, in England

Kent could provide sympathetic Gothic designs, free of serious antiquarian tendencies, when the context called; he worked on the Gothic screens in Westminster Hall and Gloucester Cathedral. See also Gothic art Gothic architecture is a style of Architecture which flourished during the high and late medieval period. Gloucester Cathedral, or the Cathedral Church of St Peter and the Holy and Undivided Trinity, in Gloucester, England, stands in the north of the city

Landscape architect

As a landscape designer, Kent was one of the originators of the English landscape garden, a style of 'natural' gardening that revolutionised the laying out of gardens and estates. The term English garden or English park (Jardin anglais Giardino all'inglese Englischer Landschaftsgarten is used in Continental Europe His projects included Stowe, Buckinghamshire, from about 1730 onwards, designs for Alexander Pope's villa garden at Twickenham, for Queen Caroline at Richmond and notably at Rousham House, Oxfordshire, where he created a sequence of Arcadian set-pieces punctuated with temples, cascades, grottoes, Palladian bridges and exedra, opening the field for the larger scale achievements of Capability Brown in the following generation. Stowe House is a Grade I listed Country house located in Stowe Buckinghamshire Alexander Pope (21 May 1688 – 30 May 1744 is generally regarded as the greatest English Poet of the eighteenth century best known for his Satirical Twickenham is a suburb in the London Borough of Richmond upon Thames, in south west London. Richmond is a town and the principal settlement of the London Borough of Richmond upon Thames in England. Rousham House is a Jacobean style Country house in Oxfordshire, England. In Architecture, an exedra is a semicircular recess often crowned by a half- Dome, which is usually set into a building's facade His all-but-lost gardens at Claremont, Surrey, have recently been restored. Claremont Landscape Garden, just outside Esher, Surrey, England, is one of the earliest surviving gardens of its kind &mdash still featuring its original Surrey is a county in the South East of England and is one of the Home Counties. It is often said that he was not above planting dead trees to create the mood he required.

Kent's only real downfall was said to be his lack of horticultural knowledge and technical skill (which people like Charles Bridgeman possessed - whose impact on Kent is often underestimated), but his naturalistic style of design was his major contribution to the history of landscape design. Charles Bridgeman (1690-1738 was an English garden designer in the onset of the naturalistic landscape style Claremont, Stowe, and Rousham are places where their joint efforts can be viewed. Stowe and Rousham are Kent's most famous works. At the latter, Kent elaborated on Bridgeman's 1720s design for the property, adding walls and arches to catch the viewer's eye. At Stowe, Kent used his Italian experience, particularly with the Palladian Bridge. At both sites Kent incorporated his naturalistic approach.

Furniture designer

His stately furniture designs complemented his interiors: he designed furnishings for Hampton Court Palace (1732), for Devonshire House in London, and at Rousham. Hampton Court Palace is a former royal palace in the London Borough of Richmond upon Thames, south west London, England. Devonshire House in Piccadilly was the London residence of the Dukes of Devonshire, one of England 's most prominent aristocratic families for The royal barge he designed for Frederick, Prince of Wales can still be seen at the National Maritime Museum, Greenwich. The Prince Frederick Prince of Wales (Frederick Louis 1 February 1707 &ndash 31 March 1751) was a member of the Hanoverian and The National Maritime Museum (NMM in Greenwich, England is the leading Maritime museum of the United Kingdom and may be the largest museum Greenwich ( ˈɡrɛnɪtʃ GREN-itch /ˈɡrɛnɪdʒ/ GREN-idge or /ˈɡrɪnɪdʒ/ GRIN-idge is a district in south-east London,

In his own age, Kent's fame and popularity were so great that he was employed to give designs for all things, even for ladies' birthday dresses, of which he could know nothing and which he decorated with the five classical orders of architecture. A classical order is one of the ancient styles of building design in the classical tradition, distinguished by their proportions and their characteristic profiles and details These and other absurdities drew upon him the satire of William Hogarth who, in October 1725, produced a Burlesque on Kent's Altarpiece at St. William Hogarth (10 November 1697 &ndash 26 October 1764 was a major English painter, printmaker, pictorial satirist, social critic Clement Danes.

Walpole tribute

According to Horace Walpole, Kent "was a painter, an architect, and the father of modern gardening. Horace Walpole 4th Earl of Orford ( 24 September, 1717 &ndash 2 March, 1797) more commonly known as Horace Walpole, was a politician In the first character he was below mediocrity; in the second, he was a restorer of the science; in the last, an original, and the inventor of an art that realizes painting and improves nature. Mahomet imagined an elysium, Kent created many. "

External links

• Short biography on gardenvisit.com
• Short biography on britainexpress.com
• Design examples on furniturestyles.net

Bibliography

• Hunt, John Dixon, Garden and Grove: Italian Renaissance Garden and the English Imagination, 1600-1750, London, 1986, and pbk. London and Philadelphia, 1996.
• Hunt, J. D. (1987) William Kent, Landscape garden designer: An Assessment and Catalogue of his designs (London, A. Zwemmer Ltd).
• Jourdain, M. (1948) The Work of William Kent: Artist, Painter, Designer and Landscape Gardener (London, Country Life Limited).
• Mowl, T. (2006) William Kent: Architect, Designer, Opportunist (London, Jonathan Cape).
• Newton, N. (1971). Design of the land. Cambridge: Belknap Press of Harvard University Press. Harvard University Press ( HUP) is a Publishing house, a division of Harvard University, that is highly respected in Academic publishing.
• Ross, David (2000). William Kent. Britain Express, 1-2. Retrieved September 26, 2004, from http://www.britainexpress.com/History/bio/kent.htm
• Rogers, E. (2001). Landscape design a cultural and architectural history. New York: Harry N. Abrams, Inc.
• Wilson, M. Harry N Abrams Inc is a book publishing company in New York City, New York founded in 1949 by Harry Nathan Abrams to publish high-quality art and illustrated books I. (1984) William Kent: Architect, Designer, Painter, Gardener, 1685-1748 (London, Boston, Melbourne and Henley, Routledge & Kegan Paul).