Finished study for the internal elevation and section of the transept end, showing the central and left aisle, outer wall and attic, but with overall dimensions not as built

WRE/2/2/6

1675

Brown ink over pencil under-drawing, with additions in pencil. On two sheets, originally joined. Left sheet: 38.1 x 25.9 cm. Watermark: Strasbourg Lily WR. Right sheet: 37.9 x 26.1 cm (trimmed around moulding profiles on left). No watermark.

A very neat design in Wren’s meticulous hand for the section and internal elevation of the transept end, drawn originally on two sheets, now separated, the right one having first been trimmed around the left side of the arcade pier and pasted over the left one (see Wren Society 13, pl.9). Datable 1675 (pre-construction). Drawn scale, just under 4 ft to 1 inch (4 ft = 25.5 mm). The section is taken through the middle of the transept bay, looking towards the end wall. It is a companion to WRE/2/2/7 and shows the transept door opening 9 ft wide rather than 10 ft as executed. The smaller internal order and impost are now in their built form, but above this level the design differs from the fabric. The main internal Corinthian order is 1 ft 3 inches higher than built: 43 ft to the top of the capitals, including a sub-plinth of 2 ft. By the time construction reached church floor level Wren had reduced the overall height to 41 ft 9 inches; see WRE/2/4/10. The internal pilasters were built 40 ft high, like those on the exterior, but stand above a sub-plinth of 1 ft 9 inches high. In this drawing, the higher internal pilaster allowed Wren to align the arches of the main arcade with the architrave of the internal entablature. When he reduced the height of the pilasters, the head of this arch rose above the architrave. Reducing the main internal pilaster affected the heights of the relief panels in the upper wall; see, WRE/2/4/9 and 10. Other differences from the built design include scrolled acanthus rather than panels on the soffits of the arcade arches, nine rather than seven flutes on the pilasters, and the floor set 2-3 inches higher than the top of the external basement. This last difference indicates that the design belongs with a group of studies at a second phase in the evolution of the crypt in which the church floor is 9 ft 2 inches rather than 9 ft, as built, above the imposts of the vaults (see WRE/2/1/2-4, WRE/2/2/3 and 4). The half-width of the cathedral in this drawing is 59 ft 6 inches between the outer walls, that is 119 ft overall. The external width is 1 ft less than in the Warrant design and in the preliminary quarter-plan, WRE/2/2/1, and 2 ft less than built. When he revised the plan before construction he widened the aisles from 18 to 19 ft, adding 2 ft overall, and increasing the distance between the centres of the side and middle aisle from 38 to 39 ft. Wren may have considered a wider aisle desirable for spreading the load from the high vaults to the outer walls. Above the external cornice on the left side of the sheet, and cut off by trimming, is the pencilled section of the base of a balustrade or parapet. Behind the parapet is a wall passage, the low wall of a triforium roof and the curve of an internal buttress. Above is the fainter curve of a shallower buttress. This attic storey anticipates the design in a half-section at triforium level of c.1679-83, WRE/2/4/21. The low wall rises over the inner reveal of the aisle recess and is cut off just above the sill of a window opening. A thicker, diagonal pencil line with a slightly curving profile runs across the whole section of the aisle through the centre-line of the vault and down to the inner side of the external wall. This is probably a notional line of force tracing the descent of the thrust of the high vault. If subtended, all three curving lines meet the clerestory wall at roughly the same point, about 12 ft above the internal cornice, level with the springing of the vaults. Fine ruled pencil ‘light lines’ run diagonally at different angles across the sheet from the balustrade down to the centre of the transept. They explore the fall of light through or above the balustrade across the central space, but assume that the aisles are not covered with vaulting. They are characteristic of Hawksmoor’s hand. He probably added them to the drawing in c.1685-86 when preparing an unfinished scheme for the triforium gallery in which the saucer domes of the aisle vaults are omitted (see WRE/3/1/5).

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.

Einzelstück, Einheit

WRE/2/4/10, WRE/2/4/7, WRE/2/1/2, WRE/2/1/3, WRE/2/1/4, WRE/2/4/21, WRE/2/3/1, WRE/2/3/3, WRE/2/3/4, WRE/2/3/8, WRE/2/4/3, WRE/2/4/9, WRE/2/4/15, WRE/2/4/16, WRE/3/1/1, WRE/3/2/6