E. W. Godwin
Aileen Reid(Author)
Historic England (Publisher)
Will be published approx. on 11. September 2026
Book
Paperback/Softback
192 pages
978-1-80596-995-2 (ISBN)
Description
The architect Edward William Godwin (1833-86) was described by Max Beerbohm as 'the greatest of the aesthetes'. This and Godwin's disdain for convention as the lover of Ellen Terry and friend of Oscar Wilde has helped to frame discussion of his buildings, furniture and decorative design. His early work as a Gothic Revivalist, the designer of Northampton Town Hall, is typically presented as an immature preamble to the striking simplicity of his 1870s studio-houses in Chelsea, including the White House for his friend Whistler. This book, the first to look at his ideas through the prism of his architecture, demonstrates rather the continuities throughout his career, that all his design work - buildings, journalism, furniture, textiles and theatre - is informed by a set of principles that although they evolved radically in their expression remained remarkably consistent throughout his life, and informed throughout by his reading of John Ruskin.. To illustrate it are many newly taken photographs by a leading architectural photographer, and drawings in the tradition of the Survey of London.
More details
Series
Language
English
Place of publication
United Kingdom
Publishing group
Liverpool University Press
Illustrations
105 Illustrations
Dimensions
Height: 240 mm
Width: 170 mm
ISBN-13
978-1-80596-995-2 (9781805969952)
Copyright in bibliographic data is held by Nielsen Book Services Limited or its licensors: all rights reserved.
Schweitzer Classification
Person
Aileen Reid has been a historian on the Survey of London since 2005. This book is the result of 40 years working on Godwin.
Content
Acknowledgments Introduction 1 E W Godwin: A life 2 Principles and Practice 1: The Aesthete Ruskinian 3 'A strange and pleasurable feeling': the 1850s 4 'A fit for plate tracery': the early 1860s 5 'One great consonant common chord': the late 1860s 6 'Is art to be tethered to the dry bones of the past?': The early 1870s 7 'The best thing I ever did': the late 1870s 8 Architecture without walls: the 1880s 9 Principles and Practice 2: The Theoretical Aesthete
Notes List of Works Bibliography Index
Notes List of Works Bibliography Index