Forum Auctions
Lot 190
Wright (Thomas) Universal Architecture, Book 1. Six Original Designs of Arbours, vol.1 only (of 2), first edition, title in red & black with engraved vignette by M.Darly, list of subscribers also with engraved vignette, 12 engraved plates and plans, without the preliminary leaf ‘The Method of Executing the Design A (-F)’ (?issued later as not apparently missing), light stain to upper outer corner of title, a couple of marginal spots, stab-holes to upper or lower margins, contemporary marbled boards with paper label titled in manuscript "Designs of Arbours No1" on upper cover, a little rubbed and soiled, [Harris 951; BAL 3720, defective copy of Book I only, lacking 2 of the 12 plates), oblong folio, for the author, 1755.*** One of the great rarities of the literature of English eighteenth-century garden architecture, with fine impressions of the plates and in a contemporary binding. Thomas Wright (1711-1786) had had an initial career as a writer of books on astronomy, but had begun by the late 1740s to design garden buildings and to remodel country houses for a network of aristocratic English patrons. He announced in 1753 his intention to publish a volume of his designs for garden architecture, to be issued in three instalments covering “arbours, grottos and alcoves”, but the publication was dependent on his securing sufficient subscribers and it was not until 1755 that the present Book I, on arbours, appeared in print. The imaginative designs include a domed temple, an arbour “of the parasol kind”, an aviary, a hermitage and a platform for open air entertainment. Sadly he was unable to attract the required number of subscribers and although Book II, on grottos, followed in 1758, Book III, on alcoves, was never published."There are no other pattern-books of grottos, rustic buildings and ruined follies, nor at that time were there any books of architectural design so attractively presented in complete landscape settings." (Harris)
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