Survey of the precinct, with superimposed plan for rebuilding the frontages to create a symmetrical piazza with a free-standing rotunda on the west side

WRE/7/1/1

c.1696–97

Sir Christopher (1632–1723) Wren, William (1671–1725) Dickinson, Nicholas (c.1662–1736) Hawksmoor

Pen and brown ink over pencil and incised grey wash with additions and shading in pencil. A sheet of laid paper, 42.8 x 58.3 cm, laid down on a larger contemporary sheet of laid paper, folded and torn around the edges, 54.9 x 61.5 cm, the whole dirt-stained. No visible watermarks or countermarks

A block-plan of the precinct and cathedral, overlaid with a scheme for rebuilding all the frontages around the precinct on a symmetrical plan, with a circular piazza on the west enclosing a rotunda; preparatory for WRE/7/1/2. Drawn by Dickinson and Hawksmoor but probably with some pencil-work by Wren. Datable c.1696-97. Drawn scale, 50 ft to 1 inch. The block-plan has surveyed dimensions by William Dickinson who joined the office as a measurer in 1696. He drew dotted outlines for walled enclosures around the steps of both north and south porticoes. Drawings of the cathedral in c.1685-88 show the porticoes with walled staircase enclosures on both sides (see Geraghty 2007, nos 79, 80). In 1698 only the south portico was enclosed by a wall (see WRE/7/2/1). A year later the steps on the north side were built in a single circular flight, without straight flights at the sides (Wren Society 15, p.54). Jan Kip’s engraved plan of 1701 accurately records the built plan on both sides (Wren Society 14, pl.6). Dickinson based his block-plan on one by Wren of c.1685-87 (Geraghty 2007, no.79). This abbreviates the street pattern in a similar way. Both drawings do not show in full the two blocks of houses on the north side that were first discussed for demolition in July 1701 and whose plot divisions are marked on plans of c.1708-10 (see WRE/7/2/2; Wren Society 16, p.99). The extent of demolition had been fixed by 16 April 1703, when a sub-committee was appointed to ‘treat with the Proprietors & Tenants of the Houses to be taken down on the north side’ (Wren Society 16, p.102). The entire project must pre-date the discussions in 1701, as it would have required the demolition of almost all the buildings around the churchyard. Dickinson added the distances in feet and inches between the existing frontages and the north, south and east arms and west crossing bastions of the cathedral. He also inscribed an ornate scale bar (‘A scale of 50. Foote to an Inch’), and wrote the street names (left to right): ‘Ave mary Lane / Creede Lane / St Paules Aley / St Paules Chaine / Canon Aley / St Augustins gate’. Sketched loosely in pencil, probably by Wren, are variant schemes for new terraces in long curving lines on the north and south sides. A straight terrace on the east side incorporates an existing building with shallow projecting bays. The west end of the piazza opens into a circular space at the top of Ludgate Hill. This enlarges into an angular space on its south side which encloses a pencil-drawn rotunda on axis with the cathedral, with eight engaged columns. The bays were increased to 16 in the final scheme for the rotunda; see WRE/7/1/2-5. Hawksmoor revised the plan in ink, changing the curving frontages into straight terraces in a long, wedge-shaped piazza that frames the cathedral. Towards the east the terraces break inwards in two angular projections, the south one at a street junction. He marked the angles and breaks around the plan with ‘A’s and wrote at upper right, ‘A turretts and duplicats’. The turrets are the bays at the angles, and the ‘duplicates’ are the doubled wall pilasters that frame these bays; see WRE/7/1/8. Lightly sketched in pencil around the cathedral plan are ruled lines marked with surveyed lengths between circled points, probably by Dickinson. Churchyard railings are sketched either side of the south transept portico wall and between the north transept portico wall and the north-east angle of the west end. Bollards are sketched in a quadrant around the western steps. The positioning of the railings and bollards develops an arrangement sketched by Wren in his plan of c.1685-87 (Geraghty 2007, no.79). The context for the project is probably the completion of the choir in 1696-97; see WRE/7/1/2. A neatly finished plan by Hawksmoor of the entire scheme at Sir John Soane’s Museum is further evidence that the project sketched on this plan, and drawn in full on WRE/7/1/2, is earlier than c.1698-99, (volume 111/71; Wren Society 3, pl.31). This shows the cathedral with matching walled enclosures around the north and south porticoes. Not previously published, and first listed in the Guildhall Library collections (now at LMA) in 1999, this drawing was not part of the original St Paul's Collection, nor was it in the Bute Collection sale in 1951.

Access to the Wren office drawings held at London Metropolitan Archives is available only with advance notice and at the discretion of the Heritage Services Director, London Metropolitan Archives, 40 Northampton Road, London, EC1R 0HB.

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WRE/7/2/1, WRE/7/2/2