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John Simpson: The Queen's Gallery Buckingham Palace and Other Works
300 x 240
mm, 136 pages, mostly in colour John Simpson is one of the leading architects who, in Great Britain, continental Europe, and the United States of America, have returned in recent decades to the classical language of architecture, with all its richness, subtlety, and historic resonances. His public and private works show how this language, though abandoned by the Modernists, lends itself with particular ease to the incorporation of the latest developments in technology. The beautifully illustrated book includes his key role in the revival of traditional urbanism, as in his design for the new Paternoster Square, next to St Paul’s Cathedral, and, most recently in his Market Hall at the Prince of Wales’s new town of Poundbury, Dorset. Other chapters cover his interiors at Gonville and Caius College, Cambridge, an inspired development from the work of Soane and Cockerell, and his Ashfold House, Sussex, which also takes Soanean themes in new directions. Describing a wide range of work from furniture design to town-planning, the book gives pride of place to his major work so far, the new Queen’s Gallery at Buckingham Palace, opened by Her Majesty the Queen in May 2002 as part of the jubilee celebrations of her fiftieth anniversary as monarch. All in a sparklingly inventive and beautifully crafted classical language, the new additions include a Greek Doric entrance portico and entrance hall, with sculptured friezes and free-standing sculpture by Alexander Stoddart. A staircase leads to three large new galleries, a number of smaller ones, and a lecture hall. Behind the scenes, Simpson has completely remodelled the Royal Kitchen, staff quarters, and Trades Yard. Both John Simpson and David Watkin taught at the Prince of Wales’s Institute of Architecture when Richard John was its Director, while David Watkin is also a leading authority on the work of C.R. Cockerell and Sir John Soane, architects who profoundly influenced John Simpson. The book is thus a unique and compelling demonstration of the fruitful interchange of history and practice in modern architecture. "The appearance of this book to coincide with the opening of The Queen's Gallery is a considerable achievement in publishing terms. A number of the gallery's completed interiors, with furnishings and works of art in place, are illustrated with photographs up to the same excellent standard of those throughout the book ...... The text is all that one would expect from scholars of the stature of Richard John and David Watkin: elegant, informative and wellpitched for a general, as much as a specialist, audience." KENNETH POWELL, Architects' Journal To find the best price for a copy ordered online follow this link to MySimon's ISBN price search |